WATCH: Biden calls for ban on assault-style weapons at Gun Sense University conference

Correction: This headline has been updated to remove an incorrect location for Biden's speech: He is speaking in Washington, DC. We regret the error.

ATLANTA (AP) — Groups advocating stricter gun laws have built their political strength through multiple elections, spurred by outcry over mass shootings at schools and other public places, in addition to the daily armed violence in the country.

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Today, gun control advocates and many Democrats see additional openings created by the hardline positions of the gun lobby and their most influential champion, former President Donald Trump. They also point to controversies surrounding the National Rifle Association, which experienced leadership shakeups and a decline in membership after it was discovered that a former key executive had spent money on private jet flights and accepting vacations from of group suppliers.

At a conference in Washington on Tuesday hosted by Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund, President Joe Biden rattled off a list of gun-related accomplishments during his administration, drawing huge cheers from hundreds of people present. He also called for a ban on assault weapons and universal background checks for gun purchases.

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Biden's speech comes as his son Hunter was convicted Tuesday of three counts of lying on a federal gun purchase form in 2018 when he said he didn't was not a drug user. The president, who said he loved his son and would also respect the verdict, was leaving the event to travel to Delaware to be with his son and his family. He did not mention his son during his speech.

“We need you,” Biden told the enthusiastic members of the crowd, whom he repeatedly praised for their advocacy. “We need you to overcome the relentless opposition of the gun lobby.”

Biden's campaign says gun control could be a motivating issue for college-educated suburban women, who could be decisive in several key battlegrounds this fall. The Democratic campaign and its allies have already released clips of Trump, a Republican, saying, “We have to get over this” after an Iowa school shooting in January, then telling NRA members in May that he “did nothing” on guns during the campaign. his presidency.

There have been 15 mass killings so far in 2024, according to data collected by The Associated Press. A massacre is defined as an attack in which four or more people die, not including the perpetrator, within a 24-hour period.

Asked for comment, Trump campaign officials pointed to the former president's previous statements promising there would be no new gun regulations if he returned to the White House.

Trump has spoken twice this year at NRA events and was endorsed by the group in May. He alleged that Biden “has a 40-year history of attempting to take guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens.” His campaign and the Republican National Committee also announced the creation of a “Gun Owners for Trump” coalition that includes gun rights activists and those who work in the gun industry.

About 7 in 10 college-educated suburban women who voted in the 2022 midterm elections supported stricter gun control laws, although fewer than 1 in 10 named it as the biggest problem facing the country, according to AP VoteCast, a large survey of voters. .

An AP-NORC poll conducted in August 2023 found that about 6 in 10 independent voters said they want stricter gun laws. Only about a third of Republicans wanted broader gun legislation, while about 9 in 10 Democrats favored it.

Biden in White House gets high marks from gun control supporters

Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris highlight their action on gun policy, including the bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022, a compromise negotiated after a mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Wash. Texas. The law expanded background checks for younger gun buyers, attempted to make it harder for domestic abusers to obtain guns and allocated billions of dollars for programs to combat gun violence.

It is the most sweeping federal gun legislation since the 1994 signing of a ban on certain semi-automatic weapons; this ban expired a decade later.

Stricter gun laws are also a key pillar of Biden's anti-crime message. In his speech Tuesday, the president highlighted the more than 500 defendants who have now been charged under the 2022 law with federal gun trafficking and straw-purchasing offenses.

Biden also revitalized the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and he is the first president to create a White House office dedicated to gun violence prevention.

Angela Ferrell-Zabala, executive director of Moms Demand Action, called the Biden White House “the strongest administration we've ever seen on this issue.”

The idea of ​​going beyond the 2022 law to mandate background checks on all potential gun buyers has bipartisan support, according to an August 2023 AP-NORC poll, with about 9 in 10 Democrats and about 7 in 10 Republicans in favor. A majority of American adults wanted a nationwide ban on the sale of AR-15-style rifles, capable of firing many bullets quickly and often used in mass shootings.

Last Thursday, Vice President Harris helped lead a gathering of health care leaders that West Wing aides highlighted as the first summit of its kind at the White House to discuss guns as a as a public health crisis. She discussed guns with Students for Biden on Friday, continuing a theme of her recent speeches on college campuses across the country.

“It's a false choice to suggest that you have to be for the Second Amendment or that you want to take guns away from everyone,” Harris said Friday in Maryland, where she spoke at a series of campaign and White House events focused on gun violence.

Gun control advocates point to a potentially broader reach that extends to several elements of the Democratic coalition in recent elections: parents of schoolchildren, young voters who grew up in an era of school shootings and security drills, as well as black and Hispanic voters. Biden's approval among some of these groups has plummeted during his tenure in the White House.

“The political calculus has changed dramatically on this issue in a relatively short period of time,” said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety. Legislating guns, he said, is “an issue that elected officials once ran away from and are now rushing toward.”

Feinblatt said Everytown's political arm plans to advertise and educate voters in presidential battleground states starting this summer.

The effort draws inspiration from Everytown's strategy in Virginia's 2023 congressional elections, which yielded Democratic majorities. Advertisements running in every city in suburban and exurban districts portrayed Republicans as threats to “public health and safety.”

An NRA still as powerful

The NRA did not respond to a request for comment. He remains a force in Republican politics despite a series of headwinds. Wayne LaPierre, once one of the country's most powerful lobbyists, was convicted in a New York court of spending NRA funds on himself, before resigning. The NRA's membership and revenue have plummeted.

Ferrell-Zabala of Moms Demand Action called the group “agitated.” She said the dismay has pushed some of the more conservative activists toward burgeoning groups like Gun Owners of America. Describing itself as “the only uncompromising gun lobby in Washington,” the group essentially opposes any restrictions on gun ownership and possession.

Matthew Lacombe, a professor at Case Western Reserve University who studies gun policy, said the NRA's advocacy was a factor in Trump's victory over Hillary Clinton in 2016. Lacombe said the NRA remains a strength and “represents an established base” for Trump.

“It’s part of a broader cultural identity” that goes beyond guns, he said, while adding that the dynamics within the broader electorate have changed.

“There was a time when the NRA was successful in labeling gun control advocates as extremists in this debate,” Lacombe said. “I don't think most Americans view this idea of ​​gun control as extreme anymore. They see the other side that way.”

Associated Press writers Amelia Thomson DeVeaux and Seung Min Kim in Washington and Will Weissert in Landover, Maryland, contributed to this report.