Young Adults Talk Gun Control; Trump Supports Background Checks
DAVID HOGG, FLORIDA SHOOTING SURVIVOR: I think it's disgusting personally. My father is a retired FBI agent and the FBI are some of the hardest working individuals I've ever seen in my life. They work every day, 24/7, to ensure the lives of every single American in the country. And it's wrong that the president is blaming them for this. After all, he is in charge of the</s>FBI. EMMA GONZALEZ, FLORIDA SHOOTING SURVIVOR: The FBI were some of the amazing first responders who were helping us get to safety. And the fact that he wants to discredit them in any way and that he's trying to shift our focus on to them is -- it's not -- it's not acceptable.</s>JOHN BERMAN, CNN ANCHOR: Classmates and survivors from Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School coming to the defense of the FBI after President Trump went after the agency on Twitter Sunday morning. The president suggested the FBI missed warning signs because it was spending too much time on the Russia probe. I want to bring back our panel right now. And, Molly, I think what's important here isn't the specifics about the defense of the FBI and Russia in this case, it's the fact that these kids -- and I call -- I shouldn't even call them kids, these young adults, these inspiring figures in students from this high school are putting themselves front and center in the discussion now over guns in this country. To some extent they're forcing the discussion right now. So I guess my question is, does this change the parameters? Does it mean that this will not be ignored now?</s>MOLLY BALL, CNN POLITICAL ANALYST: Well, it's not being ignored in this moment. What I would say is, ask me again a month from now. After Newtown there was a ground swell of activism. And the parents were extremely compelling and articulate and forceful figures and they were clear in articulating the demands that they had and we did see movement in the Congress, right? We saw Joe Manchin and Pat Toomey, who were previously -- who have always been pro-Second Amendment figures, come together on what they considered a modest and bipartisan possibility for advancing gun control. And, you know, the opponents of that kind of legislation are just very patient and they knew that if they just waited long enough it would lose momentum and it would fizzle out and that was what happened. And that's what happened since. And that's what leads to the sense of fatalism. So, absolutely, a lot of people -- this issue burns very hot. The question is, is that passion going to be sustained or is it just going to fizzle out just because it's hard to sustain that level of emotion over the long term and to get organized in way that would actually force action?</s>BERMAN: You know, Matt Lewis, you say President Trump is uniquely positioned here for this discussion. And, in fact, you know, just this morning the White House says he might be amenable to some changes to the background system. We'll see what those are. But do you think he can take some action here?</s>MATT LEWIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, I think it's certainly possible. Look, I mean Donald Trump is somebody who, number one, deep down does not have the same philosophical, conservative instincts that a lot of Republican presidents might have. This is a guy who has supported what I would call sort of moderate gun control in the past as a, you know, billionaire from New York City. He's a little bit different. So that gives us the possibility. You could look at the other side of the coin, though, which is to say the NRA heavily supported him during his presidential election and stuck by him when a lot of people were abandoning him. So that -- that puts him in conflict. If Donald Trump wants to become -- if he wants to have a legacy, if he wants to transcend just having a strong base and actually become president of everybody the way that Bill Clinton did after 1994 when Bill Clinton kind of triangulated, he has that opportunity. I think that Donald Trump, because he is so trusted by working class, rank and file, sort of blue collar folks, he would have the leverage and the credibility to say, look, we're not trying to take away your guns, we're not trying to take away the Second Amendment. I'm here to fix things, though. And this is -- we need to cut a deal because we just can't have our kids getting killed, you know, month in and month out in these school shootings.</s>BERMAN: Right.</s>LEWIS: He could rise to the occasion. I hope he does it. Maybe he is doing it right now. We'll see.</s>BERMAN: Let me just read you an excerpt from his book. You said billionaire Donald Trump. This is what he wrote in 2000, one of his books way back when. He said, I generally oppose gun control but I support the ban on assault weapons and I also support a slightly longer waiting period to purchase a gun. I don't think an assault weapon ban is something that would ever become reality now, but it does show that the president certainly has perhaps, you know, stricter views on gun control than some of his supporters do. And, Errol Louis, this morning we learned from the White House that he seemed supportive of some -- of a tightening of the background check system. John Cornyn proposed this after the Sutherland Springs shooting, which I think was November. I've lost track there are so many of them right now. But this has to do with making sure that everyone reports everything they're supposed to. This is low-hanging fruit. This is very low-hanging fruit. But if you start doing these things that most people can agree on, then maybe you start fixing some of the problems?</s>ERROL LOUIS, CNN POLITICAL COMMENTATOR: Well, yes, you -- you know, God bless the optimism that you bring to the conversation, but I don't see any reason to think that any of that is going to happen. I mean that book that has Donald Trump's name on it is, you know, a generation ago at this point, really, and it's several campaigns ago. It's not something he's probably going to do. There's an extraordinary amount of bad faith involved here, John, where you have people mouthing all of the right pieties and very much, as Molly suggests, the minute our attention waivers just a tiny bit, you see stuck into all kinds of local bills, all kinds of federal legislation, all kinds of dangerous, active attempts to not just do nothing on gun control, but to actively undermine what little we have there. I mean there was a bill that passed last year, passed the House. So whatever Paul Ryan has to say, we should ask him about the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017 which would allow people from whatever jurisdiction, if you have a Concealed Carry permit, to use it anywhere in the country, notwithstanding local regulations.</s>BERMAN: And, in fact, that legislation was tied to the thing I was just talking about right now, fixing some of the background checks. So a little bit of giveth and taketh away there. You know, to Molly's point, we'll check back in a month. These kids say they're marching on Washington on March 24th. That's an eternity. If this discussion can maintain itself until March 24th, and perhaps with a new spotlight on that day, it's hard to see how it will be ignored from either side. Molly Ball, matt Lewis, Errol Louis, thanks so much. And, of course, this itself is a big week and a big time for this discussion. Join CNN Wednesday night. A special town hall with students and parents effected by the Parkland school shooting. I think every parent and student is affected by that shooting. Jake Tapper is going to moderate the event. It's at 9:00 Eastern only on CNN. Special Counsel Robert Mueller says that Russian trolls tricked Americans into helping them meddle in the 2016 election. This morning, the Kremlin reacts for the first time.