Bloomberg calls for universal background checks

BALTIMORE — New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg brought his campaign for tougher gun laws here Monday, calling for the White House and Congress to support universal background checks for all firearms sales, stiffer penalties for gun traffickers and limits on the sales of assault weapons with high capacity ammunition clips.

"Enough is enough,'' Bloomberg said. "It is time for Congress to put public health above special interests and politics.''

Bloomberg, co-chairman of Mayors Against Illegal Guns and one of the most vocal advocates for gun control, made his remarks to open a two-day meeting on gun policy at Johns Hopkins University. His comments come just as the White House prepares to release its recommendations on new gun legislation in wake of last month's massacre at a Connecticut elementary school.

Daniel Webster, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research, said representatives of the National Rifle Association were not invited to the summit. Webster said he did not believe the group was interested in a "meaningful" discussion.

"They are interested in putting armed guards in schools," Webster said. "I think the problem is bigger than that."

The NRA did no respond to a request for comment.

Bloomberg said the deadly shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary School were "the straw that has broken the camel's back'' in the long debate over gun rights in America.

"It is clear that we meet today at a critical and hopeful moment,'' said Bloomberg, speaking at the university's School of Public Health named for the New York mayor and Johns Hopkins graduate.

In addition to legislative action, Bloomberg called on President Obama to take executive action that would install a director at the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco Firearms and Explosives, which has been without permanent leadership for six years; prosecute criminals who lie on background check applications for firearms purchases at licensed gun dealers; and free up some firearms tracking information now shielded by federal law.

The mayor also called on the federal government to fund and support public health research into gun violence, saying that study has been successfully thwarted by the gun rights lobby.

Bloomberg said the package of proposals falls "within the bounds of the Second Amendment'' and the right to gun ownership.

"This is not a constitutional question,'' he said. "This is a question of courage… There is no debate here. It's common sense.''

Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who introduced Bloomberg, said he was preparing a separate set of state legislative proposals that would ban military-style assault weapons, limit the size of ammunition magazines, provide additional funding for school security and create a state center that would help identify people with serious mental illness.

O'Malley said the proposals were not meant to "ban guns.''

"There is a sickness in our country and that sickness is gun violence,'' O'Malley said. "We're putting in place common sense things that can prevent lives being taken from us.

"There may not be, perhaps there is no way to prevent the next Newtown tragedy,'' O'Malley said. "But perhaps there is.''