President Barack Obama said Thursday that grief-filled parents in Orlando pleaded with him to take steps preventing the kind of gun violence that took their children. But he acknowledged, exasperatedly, that he could offer them few promises.
"Our politics have conspired to make it as easy as possible for a terrorist or even just a disturbed individual to buy extraordinarily powerful weapons, and they can do so legally," Obama said after meeting with families who lost loved ones in the Orlando nightclub shooting that took place Sunday.
"I held and hugged grieving family members and parents and they asked, 'Why does this keep happening?' And they pleaded that we do more to stop the carnage," Obama said. "They don't care about the politics. Neither do I."
The role of consoler in chief was a repeat assignment for Obama, was has now traveled to 10 American cities -- including four in the last year -- scarred by mass shooting events. In Orlando, he met at a downtown arena with both families of victims and survivors of the terrorist attack, many of whom suffered serious injuries but emerged from the massacre alive.
Prior to their meeting with families and survivors, Obama and Vice President Joe Biden spoke to local law enforcement officials to thank them for their actions in responding to the attack at Pulse nightclub, according to the White House.
During the shooting rampage the gunman, Omar Mateen, exchanged text messages with his wife, it was reported on Thursday, as well as posting on Facebook and placing a phone call to a television station. Police killed Mateen, 29, a U.S. citizen born in New York to Afghan immigrants.
Obama, who has visited mass shooting victims' families in towns from San Bernardino, California, to Newtown, Connecticut, since he has been president, laid flowers at a memorial for the victims of the attack on the Pulse nightclub.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack but U.S. officials have said they do not believe Mateen was assisted from abroad. CIA Director John Brennan told a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Thursday that the agency had "not been able to uncover any direct link" between Mateen and militants abroad.
A married couple also claiming allegiance to Islamic State shot dead 14 people in San Bernardino, California, in December.
"Our politics have conspired to make it as easy as possible for a terrorist or even just a disturbed individual to buy extraordinarily powerful weapons, and they can do so legally," Obama said after meeting with families who lost loved ones in the Orlando nightclub shooting that took place Sunday.
"I held and hugged grieving family members and parents and they asked, 'Why does this keep happening?' And they pleaded that we do more to stop the carnage," Obama said. "They don't care about the politics. Neither do I."
The role of consoler in chief was a repeat assignment for Obama, was has now traveled to 10 American cities -- including four in the last year -- scarred by mass shooting events. In Orlando, he met at a downtown arena with both families of victims and survivors of the terrorist attack, many of whom suffered serious injuries but emerged from the massacre alive.
Prior to their meeting with families and survivors, Obama and Vice President Joe Biden spoke to local law enforcement officials to thank them for their actions in responding to the attack at Pulse nightclub, according to the White House.
During the shooting rampage the gunman, Omar Mateen, exchanged text messages with his wife, it was reported on Thursday, as well as posting on Facebook and placing a phone call to a television station. Police killed Mateen, 29, a U.S. citizen born in New York to Afghan immigrants.
Obama, who has visited mass shooting victims' families in towns from San Bernardino, California, to Newtown, Connecticut, since he has been president, laid flowers at a memorial for the victims of the attack on the Pulse nightclub.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack but U.S. officials have said they do not believe Mateen was assisted from abroad. CIA Director John Brennan told a Senate Intelligence Committee hearing on Thursday that the agency had "not been able to uncover any direct link" between Mateen and militants abroad.
A married couple also claiming allegiance to Islamic State shot dead 14 people in San Bernardino, California, in December.
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