Joe Biden has been heckled on the White House lawn by a father whose 17-year-old son was one of many students killed in a school shooting.
US President Joe Biden has been heckled during a speech about gun laws on the White House lawn by the bereaved father of a 17-year-old boy who was killed in a mass shooting.
Mr Biden renewed his call for an assault weapons ban on Monday and was celebrating the passage of the new bipartisan gun law when he was interrupted by Manuel Oliver, whose teen son, Joaquin, was one of the 17 people killed in the Parkland shooting in 2018.
Mr Oliver was one of several survivors and family members at the White House event and interjected as Mr Biden was saying that the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, which provides funding for crisis intervention and mandates due process procedures for states with “red flag” laws, was proof that, “despite the naysayers, we can make meaningful progress on dealing with gun violence”.
“We have to do more than that,” Mr Oliver yelled from the audience.
The President paused before responding: “Sit down – you’ll hear what I have to say”.
“Let me finish my comments,” Mr Biden added.
Mr Oliver repeated that more has to be done and called on the president to open a White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention and appoint a gun tsar, website Politico reports.
“You have to open an office in the White House. Name a director,” he could be heard saying. Much of his shouting was inaudible at the outdoor event hosted on the White House’s South Lawn.
The President responded to Mr Oliver’s demands, responding that “we have one” in response to the call for a federal office dedicated to gun violence.
White House staff then moved towards Mr Oliver as Mr Biden urged them to “let him talk; let him talk” but he was swiftly escorted out of the event.
The President went on, “Make no mistake about it, this legislation is real progress, but more has to be done”.
“The provision of this new legislation is going to save lives and it’s proof that today’s politics we can come together on a bipartisan basis and get important things done. Even on an issue as tough as guns.”
Mr Oliver’s spokesman, JP Hervis, told NBC News that Mr Oliver never thought the event should be a celebration and that it would allow Republicans to claim they had taken action to address gun violence and avoid additional change.
The father tweeted on Monday morning that he was upset about plans to celebrate the new law, which included enhanced background checks for would-be gun buyers between the ages of 18 and 21.
“The word CELEBRATION has no space in a society that saw 19 kids massacred just a month ago,” Mr Oliver wrote. “‘Most people over-estimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.’ Not me, not Joaquin.”
In a CNN interview before the event, Mr Oliver said: “It’s like we’re going to a party, to a wedding today … I really wish there were more in this package of bills.”
In his remarks on Monday, Mr Biden repeated his earlier call for Congress to ban “assault weapons”.
However, that’s unlikely to happen due to lack of support, particularly in the Senate, where 60 votes are needed to advance most legislation. There has been bipartisan support, however, for raising the legal age limit to purchase semiautomatic weapons from 18 to 21.
The new gun policy bill passed after a pair of mass shootings in May. On May 24, 18-year-old Salvador Ramos used a legally purchased AR-15-style rifle to murder 21 people at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas. Just 10 days earlier, 18-year-old Payton Gendron allegedly murdered 10 people at a Buffalo grocery store with an AR-15-style rifle that he also legally purchased.
The ceremony took place one week after another mass shooting at a Fourth of July parade in Highland Park, Ill., killed seven people and injured dozens more.
The new gun policy law authorised $750 million ($A1.1bn) for state-run crisis intervention programs such as “red flag” laws that allow authorities to temporarily confiscate guns from people suspected of ill intentions.
The legislation also bans people from possessing guns if they are convicted of violence against a romantic partner. A prior federal restriction was less comprehensive.
It’s rare for a president to be heckled during a speech — especially on White House grounds, the NY Post reported.
When Mr Biden was vice president, he patted then-President Barack Obama on the back in 2015 as Obama memorably scolded a heckler opposed to the deportation of LGBT illegal immigrants.
“Shame on you,” Mr Obama told the transgender immigration activist at a Pride Month event. “Listen, you’re in my house … It’s not respectful.”
Mr Oliver has previously criticised the Biden administration for not doing enough to respond to mass shootings. Earlier this year, he climbed a crane in Washington to demand that the president or Congress pass meaningful measures.
“The whole world will listen to Joaquin today. He has a very important message. I asked for a meeting with Joe Biden a month ago. Never got that meeting,” Mr Oliver said in a video taken high above the street.
Originally published as Joe Biden heckled by a school shooting victim’s dad during speech about gun legislation
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