Sharp differences are forming between lawmakers over President Barack Obama’s gun-reform proposals between those who want narrowly written bills and precise legislation and those who favor a heavy-handed approach,
The New York Times reports.
The newspaper says many Democrats, and some Senate Republicans, believe the only bills that could pass “are tightly focused on more consensus elements.’’
Those elements include “enhancing background checks or limits on magazines, subjected to debate in committee and then brought to a vote after building bipartisan support, according to the Times.
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But senators who have long pushed for gun control believe a slow process gives too much time for opposition to build.
They want “fast-track measures by adding them as amendments to other bills, even blocking bills in ways that have angered Democrats, until they are granted votes on those ideas,’’ The Times says.
House Republicans probably will not put legislation on the floor without clear Senate action. But a spokesman for Virginia Rep. Eric Cantor, the Republican majority leader, told the Times he would not commit either way.
House Republicans have said they would look at anything the Senate passes, the newspaper says.
“I just don’t like it when you sort of put false hope out there,” Representative Greg Walden of Oregon said on Thursday.
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