President Joe Biden, ahead of signing an Executive Order Thursday on gun violence, acknowledged Saturday’s mass shooting in Birmingham in which a Glock switch was found on one of the firearms that enabled it to be converted into an automatic weapon.
“Over 100 shell casings,” Biden said. “Community shattered. Enough.”
The president was introduced during the White House event by Birmingham Mayor Randall Woodfin. The mayor told the crowd of gun violence survivors that “saving lives” ought not to be a partisan nor even a political manner.
“Saving lives should not be a Democrat or a Republican thing,” Woodfin said. “Saving lives is the most American thing we can do together.”
Woodfin was one of four speakers during the White House ceremony ahead of the Executive Order signing. Also speaking were Biden; Vice President Kamala Harris; and Sari Kaufman, a survivor of the 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla.
Vice President Kamala Harris talks with Mayor Randall Woodfin, Birmingham, Ala., in the East Room of the White House in Washington, Thursday, Sept. 26, 2024, during an event on gun violence in the United States. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh)AP
The order includes establishing a federal task force assigned to do a deep dive analysis into machine gun conversion devices like Glock switches, which have soared in use in recent years. The cheap devices are often called trigger activators, and are affixed on a gun to turn it into an automatic weapon
From 2017-2021, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives recovered 5,454 of conversion devices. That represented a 570 percent increase over the previous five-year period, according to a White House fact sheet.
The Executive Order’s signing as investigators continue to search for the perpetrators of Saturday’s shootings within the Five Points entertainment district in Birmingham. Four people were killed, and 17 were injured in a shooting by multiple individuals who reportedly opened fire at a popular nightlife spot in what police described as a targeted “hit” on one of the people killed.
Police say a Glock switch was used in the Birmingham mass homicide and Alabama lawmakers are considering a state ban on the devices. They are outlawed under federal law.
“I’m grateful to our President, and our Vice President as well who are taking more action to help people not only in Birmingham but across our country,” Woodfin said. “Today, we work to loosen the grip that gun violence has on our communities.”
Harris also mentioned the Birmingham shooting during their remarks, introducing Woodfin and calling him a “leader and a friend” and someone who “understands the urgency of this crisis” and who has seen his community “shaken by tragedy.”
Randall Woodfin, Mayor of Birmingham, Alabama, speaks during an event in the East Room of the White House on September 26, 2024, in Washington, D.C. President Biden signed an executive order to combat gun violence in America. (Photo by Samuel Corum/Sipa USA)(Sipa via AP Images)Sipa USA via AP
The executive order is twofold: One element focuses on curbing the use of machine gun conversion devices, and the second looks to make school shooting drills less traumatic and more effective for children.
The order also comes several weeks after a school shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Ga., left two teachers and two students dead.
Harris said that gun violence, more than cancer and automobile accidents, is the “No. 1 cause of death of children in the U.S.”
The White House speech also offered a venue for Harris and Biden to make a pitch for a list of gun control measures such as an assault weapons ban, end legal immunity for the gun industry, and increase funding for the ATF.
Some of those proposals have long met resistance from Republican leaders and gun lobby groups like the National Rifle Association.
“This Executive Order is just one more attempt by the Biden-Harris Administration to deflect attention from their soft-on-crime policies that have emboldened criminals in our country,” Randy Kozuch, executive director with the NRA Institute for Legislative Action, said in a statement ahead of the White House gathering. “The orders are notably heavy on election-year rhetoric and light on substance. It’s no secret that Americans don’t feel safe under the Biden-Harris Administration, as evidenced by the record number of firearms being purchased for the defense of self and family.”
Biden, during his remarks, criticized Republican Vice- Presidential candidate J.D. Vance for saying that school shootings were a “fact of life” following the Apalachee shooting.
“Who the hell do these people think they are?” Biden said.
The Executive Order establishes the Emerging Firearms Threats Task Force, consisting of leadership from federal departments and agencies. The group will be directed to issue a report within 90 days that includes the following:
- Threats posed by machine gun conversion devices, which are illegal under federal law, as well as un-serialized (no serial number), 3D-printed firearms.
- An assessment of federal agencies’ operational and legal capacities to detect, intercept, and seize machine gun conversion devices and un-serialized (no serial number), 3D-printed firearms.
- An interagency plan for combatting these emerging threats.
The report, according to the White House, will identify any additional authorities or funding the federal agencies need from Congress in order to complete the work.
Alabama State Rep. Phillip Ensler, D-Montgomery, said the Executive Order illustrates the Biden-Harris Administration’s prioritization of gun violence, which he said is “encouraging.”
Ensler is the sponsor of HB26, making it a Class C felony under Alabama state law – punishable by up to 10 years in state prison – for anyone caught with a Glock switch on a pistol.
Related content: GOP lawmakers now back Glock switch ban after mass shooting at Birmingham Hush lounge – al.com
“Whatever they do on the federal level, there is very much a need to have a state level ban which is why I am advocating passage for that,” said Ensler, who was not at the White House for the ceremony. “We want to make sure our district attorneys in Alabama can deter and hold (gunmen) accountable.”
Some Republicans, in recent days, have questioned why a state law is needed when there is a federal law prohibiting them. The Alabama House passed a similar measure in May, but it did not come up for a vote in the Senate. Mississippi lawmakers moving to crack down on machine gun conversion devices | AP News, which – like Alabama — is a Republican-run state.
Ensler said that a state law gives local law enforcement the ability to punish criminals in possession of the conversion devices.
“A district attorney in Alabama cannot prosecute a federal level crime,” Ensler said. “This empowers our local law enforcement and district attorneys to have another tool in the toolbox. It’s just expanding accountability measures that are out there.”
