US president faces tough questions over stricter gun law
US President Barack Obama has come under fire from critics of his latest push for harsher gun laws in a country witnessing an upsurge in gun violence.
Obama fielded tough questions from gun owners at a televised town hall gathering on Thursday, defending his move to tighten gun rules as he sought to elevate the issue of gun control before the November 2016 election to replace him, according to Reuters.
After he recently failed to convince Congress to toughen up gun laws, the president said he wanted to have a national debate about guns in his final year in office.
Obama, who said he had never owned a gun, has blamed Congress for being beholden to the National Rifle Association, a powerful lobby group that fights any action that might infringe on Americans' constitutional right to bear arms.
Congress has not approved major gun-control legislation since the 1990s.
Aired live on CNN from a university just miles away from the group's Virginia headquarters, the program showed Obama taking a barrage of questions from people who argued against his gun rule proposals.
Some said laws would not stop people with criminal intent.
Obama’s proposals call for expanding background checks on gun buyers, hiring more FBI agents to process background checks for gun sales, and requiring gun dealers to notify federal authorities if their guns are lost in transit.
The president has enraged Republicans who say he has overstepped his authority.
According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), firearms are the cause of death for more than 33,000 people in the United States every year, a number that includes accidental discharge, murder and suicides.
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