WASHINGTON _ President Trump began Thursday on Twitter defending the concept of arming teachers, which he'd floated the day before at a White House session with gun violence survivors held in response to last week's Parkland, Fla., high school killings.
In a series of morning tweets, Trump raised the possibility of raising the minimum age for gun purchases to 21, bolstering the process of checking backgrounds of potential buyers and banning the so-called bump stocks that turn legal firearms into illegal rapid-fire ones.
But before listing those ideas, the president began the morning with four tweets vigorously defending his proposal to extend "concealed carry" gun permits to school personnel, an idea that was immediately criticized by teachers at the Parkland school who witnessed the killings of 17 students and adults.
Some 20 percent of teachers would be able to "immediately fire back if a savage sicko came to a school with bad intentions," he wrote. "Highly trained teachers would also serve as a deterrent to the cowards that do this."
Congress, he said, "is in a mood to finally do something on this issue _ I hope!"
The National Rifle Association, which Trump lauded in one of his tweets, has come out against raising the minimum age for gun purchases to 21, a stand that will raise a hurdle for the proposal in the Republican-controlled Congress.
