#Biden says gun violence ‘tearing communities apart’ after latest mass shootings

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Joe Biden on Tuesday said gun violence was tearing apart U.S. communities after mass shootings in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Fort Worth claimed the lives of at least 10 people ahead of the Fourth of July holiday.

Much more action is needed to “address the epidemic of gun violence that is tearing our communities apart,” Biden said in a statement released by the White House. He called on Republican lawmakers in the U.S. Congress to negotiate with his fellow Democrats on gun reforms.

“It is within our power to once again ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, to require safe storage of guns, to end gun manufacturers’ immunity from liability, and to enact universal background checks,” Biden said in the written remarks.

Biden has made similar pleas before. Deadly mass shootings tend reignite the heated debate over gun control in the United States.

The U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment that protects the right to bear arms is a hot button issue for many Republicans, who receive millions of dollars in donations from gun rights groups and manufacturers.

The United States has been struggling with a large number of mass shootings and incidents of gun violence this year.

There have been over 340 mass shootings so far in 2023 in the country, according to data collected by the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as an incident in which at least four people are shot, excluding the shooter.

Biden’s remarks come after Monday night’s shootings in Fort Worth, Texas and in Philadelphia, that killed three and five people, respectively. A day earlier, two people were shot dead and 28 others injured, about half of them children, in a hail of gunfire at an outdoor neighborhood block party in Baltimore, Maryland.

(Reporting by Kanishka Singh in Washington; Editing by Bill Berkrot)