Biden urges stricter gun control after spate of holiday weekend shootings

• President Joe Biden on Tuesday again called for stricter gun control after mass shootings in Philadelphia, Baltimore and Fort Worth, Texas.
• His comments come a year after a mass shooting at a Highland Park, Illinois, Fourth of July parade.
• He called for universal background checks and a ban on semi-automatic rifles.

U.S. President Joe Biden speaks about the Supreme Court's decision overruling student debt forgiveness in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in Washington, D.C., June 30, 2023.

Jim Watson | AFP | Getty Images

President Joe Biden on Tuesday again called for stricter gun control, including a ban on semi-automatic rifles, after several deadly "tragic and senseless shootings" leading up to the July Fourth holiday.

At least 10 people were killed in mass shootings in Baltimore Philadelphia, and Fort Worth, Texas. The incidents — as well as others in Wichita, Kansas, and Lansing, Michigan — left dozens of others injured.

A string of shootings in Chicago over the holiday weekend killed five and left at least 30 more wounded, NBC Chicago reports.

Baltimore police forensics officers place evidence markers next to bullet casings while investigating the scene of a mass shooting at Edmondson and Whitmore avenues, where one man is dead at the scene and seven others were injured. The police are looking for one male shooter who fired into a crowd at a couple of cookouts in the block, according to police commissioner Michael Harrison.

Kenneth K. Lam | Baltimore Sun | Getty Images

"It is within our power to once again ban assault weapons and high-capacity magazines, to require safe storage of guns, to end gun manufacturers' immunity from liability, and to enact universal background checks," Biden said in a statement on Tuesday.

His comments come one year after a mass shooting at a Highland Park, Illinois, Fourth of July parade that killed seven people and wounded nearly 50 others.

In January, Illinois banned the sale of semi-automatic weapons and high-capacity magazines.

"As we have seen over the last few days, much more must be done in Illinois and across America to address the epidemic of gun violence that is tearing our communities apart," Biden said.

There have been 346 mass shootings so far this year in the U.S., according to the Gun Violence Archive, which defines a mass shooting as an incident in which four or more people are shot or killed, excluding the shooter.