During a speech to survivors of the Parkland shooting, President Donald Trump appeared to contradict an earlier claim he made about gun reform during his 2016 election campaign.

Trump once tweeted that Hillary Clinton was "wrong" for saying he wanted "guns brought into the school classroom."

On Wednesday, Trump floated the possibility of having more armed teachers in schools to prevent school shootings.



President Donald Trump's speech to survivors of the Parkland school shooting on Wednesday appeared to contradict an earlier claim he made on gun reform during his 2016 presidential campaign.

"Crooked Hillary said that I want guns brought into the school classroom," Trump tweeted in May 2016, referring to then-Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. "Wrong!"

But as Trump hosted a listening session at the White House with survivors and family members of victims of school shootings, he floated the possibility of arming more teachers in schools.

"It only works where you have people very adept at using firearms," Trump said. "It would be teachers and coaches."

Trump appeared to suggest that if Aaron Feis, an assistant football coach who died while shielding students at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School, was armed, the gunman would have been stopped sooner: "If the coach had a firearm in his locker when he ran at this guy ... if he had a firearm, he wouldn't have had to run, he would have shot and that would have been the end of it," Trump said.

Trump then went on to weigh the merits of eliminating gun-free zones in schools and allowing armed teachers who have "special training" to access their firearm in schools.

"Gun-free zone to a maniac, because they're all cowards ... is 'Let's go in and let's attack because bullets aren't coming back at us,'" Trump said. "If you do this, and a lot of people are talking about it, and it's certainly a point that we'll discuss, but concealed-carry for teachers and for people of talent, of that type of talent."

At least 17 people were killed in the February 14 shooting at the high school in Parkland, Florida. Supporters of gun reform, many of them survivors of the shooting, have called for increased gun-control measures.