President Trump suggested a controversial solution to America's gun violence crisis during a listening session with survivors and family of survivors on Wednesday. "If you had a teacher who was adept at firearms, they could very well end the attack very quickly," the president said. "I really believe if these cowards knew that the school was well guarded … I think they wouldn't go into the school to start off with."
On Thursday, Trump backed off the proposal, only to reiterate it again:
Trump faced pushback immediately from Sandy Hook parents in the room for the proposal, the Hartford Courant reports. Mark Barden, who lost his son Daniel in the 2012 attack, told the president: "A deranged sociopath on his way to commit an act of murder in a school, knowing the outcome is going to be suicide, is not going to care if there's somebody there with a gun. That's their plan anyway."