Florida lawmakers, spurred by last month’s deadly high school shooting, have given final passage to a bill to raise the legal age for buying rifles, impose a three-day waiting period on all gun sales and allow the arming of some school employees.
Swift action in the Republican-controlled statehouse, where the National Rifle Association (NRA) has long held sway, was propelled in large part by the extraordinary lobbying efforts of young survivors from the massacre three weeks ago at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland.
But the legislation, while containing a number of provisions student activists and their parents from Parkland, Florida, had embraced, left out one of their chief demands - a ban on assault-style weapons like the one used in the February 14 rampage.
The bill overcame strenuous objections to provisions permitting school staff to carry guns on the job, says a Reuters report.
Critics say that will pose a particular risk to minority students, who they say are more likely to be shot in the heat of a disciplinary situation or if mistaken as an intruder.
Still, a group of families of victims and survivors of the shooting applauded the legislation’s passage in a message posted on Twitter by parent Ryan Petty, whose daughter was among those killed, and urged Republican Governor Rick Scott to sign it.
The measure will automatically become law within 15 days unless vetoed by Scott, who said on Wednesday prior to the vote that he had not yet decided whether to support the bill.
The bill’s passage signalled a possible turning point in the national debate between gun control advocates and proponents of firearms rights enshrined in the Second Amendment of the US Constitution.
The measure narrowly cleared the state Senate on Monday before passing in the House of Representatives on Wednesday in a 67-50 vote. Ten House Democrats joined 57 Republicans in supporting the bill, while 19 Republicans and 31 Democrats voted against it.
As legislators debated in Tallahassee, US Education Secretary Betsy DeVos visited Stoneman Douglas on the first full day of classes since the shooting, while the accused gunman, Nikolas Cruz, was indicted on 17 counts of murder.
