Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) (Photo by Al Drago/Getty Images)

(CNSNews.com) - Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) told a CNN town hall Monday night that if she's elected president, she will take "executive action" on guns if Congress lacks the "courage" to do something.

"There are people in Washington, D.C., supposed leaders, who have failed to have the courage to reject a false choice, which suggests you're either in favor of the Second Amendment or you want to take everyone's guns away.

“Supposed leaders in Washington, D.C., who have failed to have the courage to recognize, you know what, you want to go hunting, that's fine, but we need reasonable gun safety laws in this country, starting with universal background checks and a renewal of the assault weapon ban.

“But they have failed to have the courage to act. So, Ben, here is my response to you," Harris told the student who asked the question:

Harris promised executive action:

Upon being elected, I will give the United States Congress 100 days to get their act together and have the courage to pass reasonable gun safety laws. And if they fail to do it, then I will take executive action. And specifically what I will do is put in place a requirement that for anyone who sells more than five guns a year, they are required to do background checks when they sell those guns. I will require that for any gun dealer that breaks the law, the ATF take their license. And by the way, ATF -- alcohol, tobacco and firearms; well, the ATF has been doing a lot of "A" and "T," but not much of the "F." And we need to fix that. And then -- on the third piece, because none of us have been sleeping over the last two years, part of what's happened under the current administration is they took fugitives off the list of prohibited people. I'd put them back on the list, meaning that fugitives from justice should not be able to purchase a handgun or any kind of weapon. So that's what I'd do.

Asked if this would be her first executive action as president, Harris said it "depends on what else happens" in the first 100 days.

Harris’s concern about “fugitives” stems from guidance issued by the FBI on February 15, 2017, not even a full month into the Trump presidency.

In the past, the FBI considered people with verified outstanding arrest warrants as fugitives; but the Justice Department decided that the mere existence of an outstanding arrest warrant was not enough.

Under the new policy, a person with outstanding warrants is considered a fugitive only if he or she has fled the state to avoid prosecution.