Tonight’s remarks will amount to Biden’s most fulsome speech about guns since the Texas school shooting

President Biden will deliver a rare evening speech on guns today to press US lawmakers to take action as the US confronts another mass shooting.

Biden plans to discuss “the recent tragic mass shootings, and the need for Congress to act to pass commonsense laws to combat the epidemic of gun violence that is taking lives every day,” the White House said in announcing the speech.

The remarks will amount to Biden’s most fulsome speech about guns since a massacre at a Texas elementary school last week.

Since then, a string of additional mass shootings have unfolded in states across the country, including in Tulsa Wednesday. That shooting left five dead, including the gunman.

In the hours after the Texas massacre, Biden delivered an emotional seven-minute speech at the White House, calling the repeated gun killings of Americans “sick.”

“Why? Why are we willing to live with this carnage? Why do we keep letting this happen?” he asked.

Since then, however, Biden has only selectively waded into the debate over gun control, stopping short of endorsing any specific legislative action to prevent further carnage.

On Wednesday, the President expressed scant optimism Congress would agree on new gun control legislation, even as a bipartisan group of senators meets to weigh options.

“I served in Congress for 36 years. I’m never confident, totally,” Biden said when asked whether he believed lawmakers would agree on new gun laws.

“It depends. So I don’t know,” Biden said. “I’ve not been in the negotiations as they’re going on right now.”

The lukewarm response was an indication Biden is wary of associating too closely with the nascent efforts on Capitol Hill to arrive at a gun control compromise.

While Biden said Tuesday he would speak with lawmakers about guns, the White House later said he would only become involved when the time is right.

Both Biden and his advisers have suggested they have exhausted their options on executive action to address guns, though continue to explore avenues for unilateral action.

Speaking a day after consoling families in Texas, Biden expressed limited hope that certain Republicans, like Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and one of his top allies, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas, could be convinced to support some type of new gun laws.

“I don’t know, I think there’s a realization on the part of rational Republicans, and I consider McConnell a rational Republican, Cornyn as well. There’s a recognition on their part they can’t continue like this,” he said.

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