Trump promotes arming teachers, but rejects active shooter drills

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February 23, 2018 4:01 AM

President Donald Trump on Thursday enthusiastically embraced a National Rifle Association position to arm highly trained teachers to fortify schools against mass shootings like the one last week. Trump, who said the armed teachers should receive extra pay as an incentive, promoted his idea as demands for stronger gun control intensified across the country.

“You give them a little bit of a bonus, so practically for free, you have now made the school into a hardened target,” Trump said.

The president estimated that 10 to 40 percent of school employees would be qualified to handle a weapon — he offered no data for the claim — and said he would devote federal money to training them.

Trump has cycled through a number of proposals — including some gun limits deemed unacceptable by the NRA — in the days since the rampage killed 14 students and three adults last week at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida. On Thursday, he returned to an idea championed by the gun rights group.

“I don’t want teachers to have guns, I want certain highly adept people, people that understand weaponry, guns — if they really have that aptitude,” Trump said.

The president also said he believed the powerful gun lobby would support a move to raise the age threshold for buying firearms to 21 from 18, a change the NRA is resisting, along with enhanced background checks.

Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., the minority leader, said Trump’s emphasis on arming teachers revealed that he was in the thrall of the gun lobby. “Not surprised the NRA reeled President Trump back in,” he said. “Just amazed at how fast it happened.”

While Trump has said in recent days that he wished to strengthen background checks for people seeking to buy guns, the White House said Thursday that the president is not proposing to close a loophole for sales at gun shows.

This week, Trump ordered the Justice Department to issue regulations banning bump stocks, which convert semi-automatic guns into automatic weapons like those used last year in the massacre of concertgoers in Las Vegas.

On Thursday, Trump said he was not in favor of holding shooter drills to practice what to do.

“Active shooter drills is a very negative thing,” Trump said. “I don’t like it. I’d much rather have a hardened school.”

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

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