President Obama wrote an op-ed for the New York Times that many see as a direct burn to Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders. If Sanders were to win the Democratic Party’s nomination for president, it looks like he would not have the support of the sitting president.
“I will not campaign for, vote for or support any candidate, even in my own party, who does not support commonsense gun reform,” Obama wrote in the op-ed.
International Business Times writes:
The comments are quite clearly directed at Sanders, who has a record of supporting gun rights. President Obama even specifically mentioned Congress’s failure to place liability for gun violence on firearm manufacturers; a bill which Bernie sided with Republicans on.
Obama said this accountability stems from actions such as Congress blocking requirements that firearms have safety features, making it difficult to conduct research on gun violence research and protecting gun manufacturers from liability for gun injuries. On this last point, the president used particularly strong language, saying that Congress has “guaranteed that manufacturers enjoy virtual immunity from lawsuits, which means that they can sell lethal products and rarely face consequences.”
Sanders voted for that piece of legislation when he was in the House of Representatives in 2005, Politico reported. While Sanders has spoken out on the campaign trail about the need for gun reform, he has stood by this position and other previous gun votes while running for president.
“The issues that you’re talking about is, if somebody has a gun and it falls into the hands of a murderer, and that murderer kills somebody with the gun, do you hold the gun manufacturer responsible?” Sanders said on CNN in July. “Not any more than you would hold a hammer company responsible if somebody beat somebody over the head with a hammer.”
While we love picking on Bernie Sanders at TLR, on this issue he is spot on. Of course, most liberals don’t see it that way.
Here’s Bernie’s record on guns: