President Donald Trump. | Alex Wong/Getty Images White House White House infighting thwarts movement on guns The president remains noncommittal on a gun proposal as groups around him press their agendas.

Competing factions inside the White House have stymied efforts to unite behind gun legislation, further delaying President Donald Trump from getting behind any plan.

On one side is Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter and adviser, and Attorney General William Barr. Both are urging the president to back new firearms restrictions — including expanded background checks for gun sales — insisting he can be the leader who succeeds on an intractable issue that has bedeviled his predecessors and that he can win back moderate suburban voters in the process, according to people involved in the discussions.


On the other side, a group that includes Donald Trump Jr., the president’s son and an avid hunter, and a top aide to acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, is telling Trump he risks losing support from his conservative base if he pushes too aggressively on new gun control legislation, they say.

Then there’s Trump, who has heard all of these arguments privately but publicly hasn’t committed to any plan. For weeks, he’s left Washington guessing on whether he’d support any gun control legislation and what form the legislation would take.

The competing forces have created paralysis with just about everybody involved in the discussions — most notably senators — and have delayed the White House’s release of its long-awaited package, possibly jeopardizing the effort to enact meaningful legislation following this summer’s mass shootings that claimed dozens of lives.

The White House didn’t initially respond to a request for comment but after publication spokesman Hogan Gidley refuted the story.

“This is ridiculous, we are completely united in developing exactly what the President wants — which are meaningful solutions that will protect the second Amendment, make American communities safer and potentially prevent these types of tragedies from ever occurring again," he said in a statement.

Trump said Sunday he was still considering his options on background checks and accused House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-N.Y.) of wasting time.

“We’re looking at it right now, we’re studying it very hard, and it’s an issue that, frankly, Congress is wasting all their time on — nonsense —and we’re studying it very hard,” Trump said. “If Congress would get back to work, we could work something, but Congress is doing all of this nonsense, this garbage they're doing, and I'll tell you what, they don’t have any time.”





Donald Trump Jr. (left), President Donald Trump (center) and Ivanka Trump. The Trump children have opposing views on how the president should approach gun legislation. | Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Trump deployed Barr to speak with senators last week about potential legislation, including Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.), Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), John Kennedy (R-La.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) and John Cornyn (R-Texas). Barr, together with Eric Ueland, the White House legislative affairs director and a veteran Senate staffer, met with the senators, according to sources familiar with the talks.

“I would say that not everybody in the White House is supporting the president trying to engage and make something happen,” said Manchin, a key Senate negotiator on gun legislation. “But he’s still the president, and I think he’ll make it happen.”

Barr has earned rare Democratic praise over his efforts on gun legislation. Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), a vocal critic of the attorney general, described Barr’s role in negotiations as “constructive.” Graham, a close Trump ally, also said that Barr has been helpful with the negotiations and has “been trying to bring the law enforcement perspective to the table.”

Barr and Ueland floated a proposal, according to two Hill staffers, that would expand background checks to all commercial sales and would create an entity to perform them. But Republican senators, including Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, have said they need to hear from the president directly before seriously considering any action plan.

Those who oppose restrictions, however, are suspicious of Barr, who said at his confirmation hearing in January that “there’s room for reasonable regulation” on firearms. “What I would look for is ... what’s the burden on law-abiding people, and is it proportionate to whatever benefit in terms of safety and effectiveness will be conferred,” he told senators.

“I’d be a fool not to be worried right now,” said Dudley Brown, president of the National Association for Gun Rights, which opposed Barr’s confirmation.

Trump described the attorney general as “an expert on guns and gun control” and said he asked Barr about a week ago to get involved in Capitol Hill negotiations. The Department of Justice sent a series of proposals to the White House three weeks ago.

Ivanka Trump has also been reaching out to senators since the mass shootings. Among the senators she has spoken to is Toomey, who is working with Manchin and Murphy to find a compromise with the White House on background checks. The president’s daughter has also spoken to Blumenthal, who is working on a proposal with Graham that would encourage states to establish so-called red flag laws.

But Toomey said he was unclear what Ivanka Trump’s capacity was in the talks. “I have spoken with her about it, but I don’t know what role she’s playing at the White House,” Toomey said.

One senator who spoke to the president's daughter about gun legislation said the first daughter made it clear she wanted to do something on the issue, but did not reveal a specific opinion.

Ivanka Trump took to social media to urge Congress to "close background check loopholes" and expand “the use of extreme risk protection orders,” or red flag laws, which allow law enforcement officers to temporarily remove guns from dangerous people and spend more money on mental health programs.

“You can strongly support and defend the 2nd Amendment while calling for these common sense, and long-overdue reforms,” she posted on Instagram on the same weekend as shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio.

The White House declined to disclose details of Ivanka Trump’s meetings, but an official said “Ivanka is using her trusted relationships on both sides of the aisle in concert with the president and White House legislative and policy teams to help the White House get something meaningful done.”

But not everyone in the White House is on board with making substantial changes to gun laws, even as polls show most Americans supporting action after this summer’s mass shootings.

Senators involved in negotiations view as an obstacle Mulvaney’s counselor, Michael Williams, a former law clerk for the National Rifle Association's lobbying arm and general counselor for the American Suppressor Association, which supports easing restrictions on gun silencers.

Manchin criticized Williams, saying he suggested at a meeting that a smartphone app could help resolve the background checks issue.

“I know there’s one gentleman, young gentleman over there that has a complete different philosophy than I have, ” Manchin said. “The only thing I would say to Michael Williams is, 'If you think this technology is so great, let’s do a year study on it.'”

Williams is also in contact with the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the group representing the gun industry. Ueland, however, pushed back on criticism of Williams while on Capitol Hill last week.

“It’s important for people to realize that this president is open to and seeks input across a wide array of perspectives,” he told reporters. He added that picking on individual staffers “is completely counterproductive.”

Some say Mulvaney, a former South Carolina congressman who earned an "A" rating from the NRA as well as its endorsement, is also resistant to legislation. "There are things the government can do and there are things this government is doing, but we are never going to protect everybody against everybody who is deranged,” Mulvaney said on NBC’s “Meet the Press" after a mass shooting earlier this year.

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Trump Jr., who heads his father’s Second Amendment Coalition advisory group, also raised concerns about background checks and red flag bills with the White House, but is not speaking to members of Congress, according to people familiar with the situation. He is in touch with gun rights groups and has stayed in contact with Chris Cox, the NRA’s powerful former top lobbyist who left the organization earlier this year, they say.

Brown said those on his side have tried to convince Trump of the consequences of backing proposals, especially in states such as Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin. ”If he does something they don’t like, they’re not going to vote for him,” he said. “They won’t vote. They stay home, and he loses.”

The White House has focused on a series of proposals that Democrats deem too weak, including expediting the death penalty for mass shooters, releasing teenagers’ previously sealed records after they become adults, requiring the FBI to notify local authorities when a potential buyer fails a background check and providing more money for mental health, according to people familiar with the discussions. More recently, staff has focused on changing the definition of a gun dealer and extending the background check review period, they say.

Robin Lloyd, managing director of Giffords, a group founded to promote gun control legislation after former Rep. Gabby Giffords was shot and wounded, said it’s “frustrating” that the divisions in the White House are being used as an “excuse” for why something can’t be done.

“I don’t think it’s a valid reason. The America people are on our side,” she said. “He’s not the president of his base. He’s the president of the United States."

