“We can do it again”: US President Joe Biden on Wednesday again promised to ban assault rifles in a solemn speech at a ceremony commemorating, in particular, the massacre that took place 10 years ago at the Sandy Hook school in northeastern Connecticut. ), AFP notes.

Recalling that the United States banned semi-automatic weapons from 1994 to 2004, the leader of the White House said: “It worked,” “a significant number of lives were saved.”

“We can do it again,” the 80-year-old Democrat said in a somber speech.

Joe Biden attended the 10th annual National Rally for All Victims of Gun Violence at St. Mark’s Episcopal Church in Washington.

Recalling that he too has experienced grief – the death of his first wife and their newborn daughter in December 1972, followed by the death of his eldest son Beau Biden in May 2015 – Joe Biden described, as before, the feeling of “a black hole opening up in your chest and sucks you in.”

Expressing his admiration for the relatives and friends of the victims, as well as for the survivors who surrounded him, he invited those present to honor them with a moment of silence.

American news is punctuated by gun attacks that don’t hurt activism in everyday life, from schools to temples to supermarkets, but only the bloodiest or most hateful make headlines.

According to the Gun Violence Archive website, there have been more than 600 mass gun attacks (killing or injuring at least four people) in the United States since the beginning of this year.

Joe Biden has ordered some regulatory measures. But most Republican lawmakers and the powerful gun lobby, the NRA, oppose any truly mandatory legislation, arguing it would be unconstitutional.

In total, in 2012, a gunman armed with an assault rifle killed 26 people, including 20 children between the ages of 6 and 7, at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut.