U.S. President Barack Obama speaks about guns at a town-hall meeting in Fairfax, Virginia, on Thursday, January 7. During the event, moderated by CNN's Anderson Cooper, Obama rejected the "imaginary fiction" that he wanted to take away the guns of law-abiding Americans. He said his opponents had twisted his plans on gun safety measures.
NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images
"Our position is consistently mischaracterized," Obama said. "If you listen to the rhetoric, it is so over-the-top, it is so overheated." Earlier this week, he unveiled a series of executive actions on guns, including expanded background checks. "All of us can agree that it makes sense to do everything we can to keep guns out of the hands of people who would do others harm, or themselves harm," he said.
NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/Getty Images
Obama said he sees two sides of the gun issue. In Chicago, where gun crime is a serious issue, it's sometimes cheaper for young Americans to get a gun than a book, he said. But he noted that when he and his wife were in Iowa on the 2008 campaign trail, she said that if she lived in a farm house with a far away sheriff's department and easy access to the house from the highway: " 'I'd want to have a shotgun or a rifle to make sure I was protected and my family was protected,' " Obama said. "And she's absolutely right."
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Obama walks over to greet Taya Kyle, widow of "American Sniper" Chris Kyle, during a commercial break. Earlier in the meeting, she told Obama that background checks give "almost a false sense of hope" and wouldn't have stopped many of the mass shootings we've witnessed. She also noted murder rates are down and maybe we should "celebrate where we are." After thanking Kyle for her husband's service, Obama agreed that crime was down overall, but said, "I challenge the notion that the reason for that is more gun ownership." He compared what he's trying to do to government efforts to make cars safer. "In the same way that we don't eliminate all traffic accidents but over the course of 20 years, traffic accidents get lower ... that's the same thing that we can do with gun ownership," Obama said.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Cleopatra Cowley-Pendleton, mother of slain Chicago teen Hadiya Pendleton, is seen on a television monitor asking Obama a question.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Obama greets former U.S. Rep. Gabby Giffords during a commercial break. Giffords was shot in an assassination attempt in 2011.
NICHOLAS KAMM/AFP/AFP/Getty Images
Obama answers questions during the televised event. The President said that he would be happy to meet with representatives of the National Rifle Association, which declined to take part in the town-hall meeting even though other gun-rights advocates did attend.
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Obama answers a question from Paul Babeu, a sheriff in Arizona running for Congress. Babeu asked Obama what he's doing to prevent mass shootings, not target guns. Obama criticized the idea that "if we can't solve every crime, we shouldn't try to solve any crimes," which received applause from the audience. "The problem is in many instances, you don't know ahead of time who is going to be the criminal."
Pablo Martinez Monsivais/AP
Obama stops to greet the Rev. Michael Pfleger, a noted gun control activist from Chicago, during a commercial break.
