The Latest: Trump meeting with Florida students
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Latest on President Donald Trump and guns (all times local):
4 p.m.
President Donald Trump will meet with six students from the south Florida high school recovering from a mass shooting, along with their families and people affected by other mass shootings.
Trump is holding a listening session at the White House today in the wake of the shooting last week that killed 17.
He will also meet with parents of students killed in the Sandy Hook and Columbine massacres, a pastor from Las Vegas and the mayor of Parkland, Florida.
The White House says the goal of the session is to talk about school safety.
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1:23 p.m.
California Sen. Dianne Feinstein says the Trump administration lacks authority under current law to ban bump stocks, as President Donald Trump has urged.
Feinstein, the top Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, says in a statement that leaders of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives have made it clear since at least 2013 that bump stocks are not subject to federal firearms laws.
The ATF announced in December that it was reviewing whether weapons that use bump stocks should be considered illegal machine guns. Feinstein said that "if ATF tries to ban these devices after admitting repeatedly that it lacks the authority to do so, that process could be tied up in court for years."
Feinstein urged Trump to support legislation she has co-sponsored to ban bump stocks.
A gunman in Las Vegas used the so-called "bump stock" devices during a deadly October rampage that killed 59 people.
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1:09 p.m.
Hundreds of Maryland high school students are ditching class and rallying at the U.S. Capitol in support of stronger gun control.
Students chanted "Hey hey NRA you can't beat the PTA!" and waved signs that said, "Make Our Classrooms Safe" and "Fear Has No Place in School."
Nyrene Monforte, a junior at Montgomery Blair High School in Silver Spring, Maryland, says students feel as if their lives are threatened, "and it shouldn't be like that because we're children."
Democratic Rep. Jamie Raskin of Maryland told the crowd that "America's high school students are leading a revolution against political complacency and collusion with the NRA." He says students across the country are acting in a long tradition of youth activism "to change America when nobody else would do it."
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12:20 p.m.
The White House says President Donald Trump will host students from the Florida high school recovering from a mass shooting during a "listening session."
The White House says Trump will "host a conversation on how to improve school safety." Also in attendance will be people from groups representing survivors of the Sandy Hook and Columbine shootings.
Local parents, students and teachers will participate, as will Vice President Mike Pence and Education Secretary Betsy DeVos.
The administration is seeking to respond to the shooting in Parkland that left 17 dead. The White House says Trump "looks forward to an open discussion on how we can keep our students safe."
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12:05 p.m.
Geraldo Rivera says he's discussed the idea of raising the minimum age to purchase assault-type weapons with President Donald Trump, and says Trump "took it under advisement."
The Fox News contributor says in an email Wednesday that he spoke with Trump during a dinner at Trump's Florida estate over the weekend. He says Trump "further suggested strongly that he was going to act to strengthen background checks."
Rivera says Trump was "deeply affected" by visiting survivors of the school shooting in Parkland, Florida, that left 17 dead.
The gunman used an AR-15. Rivera says Trump was "shocked and distressed" by the wounds inflicted.
The White House has said the idea of raising the age limit to buy an AR-15 was on the table for discussion.
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1:15 a.m.
President Donald Trump says more must be done to protect America's children.
Trump is directing the Justice Department to ban devices such as the rapid-fire bump stocks used in last year's Las Vegas massacre.
Trump is hosting parents, teachers and students for a "listening session" at the White House later Wednesday that will include people affected by school shootings in Parkland, Florida, Columbine, Colorado, and Newtown, Connecticut.
Trump is a strong and vocal supporter of gun rights, and he hasn't endorsed more robust changes sought by gun control activists.
But the White House is casting the president as having been swayed by the school shooting in Florida and willing to listen to proposals.