Trump on proposed repeal of the second amendment: 'NO WAY'
- "NO WAY," was US President Donald Trump's concise rebuttal of Retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens' call for the repeal of the second amendment in The New York Times.
- Trump also seemed to campaign off the idea that the second amendment may be repealed if the US did not vote for Republicans in 2018.
- Trump and Stevens' reflection on the second amendment comes after millions around the US and the world marched over the weekend to protest gun violence and call for gun control measures.
US President Donald Trump gave a concise rebuttal of Retired Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens' call for the repeal of the second amendment in The New York Times' opinion section: "NO WAY."
"THE SECOND AMENDMENT WILL NEVER BE REPEALED! As much as Democrats would like to see this happen, and despite the words yesterday of former Supreme Court Justice Stevens, NO WAY. We need more Republicans in 2018 and must ALWAYS hold the Supreme Court!" Trump tweeted on Wednesday.
Trump and Stevens' reflection on the second amendment comes after millions around the US and the world marched over the weekend to protest gun violence and call for gun control measures.
Trump has vocally criticized the role of the National Rifle Association, the biggest pro-gun lobby, in US politics, and enacted some minor gun control measures, but remains solidly in support of the right to bear arms.
But in his op-ed Stevens argued that the Second Amendment - which holds that "A well regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed" - was intended to protect Americans from a threat they no longer face in the 21st Century.
Amending the constitution is among the most difficult tasks for the government to carry out. Both houses of Congress have to propose and pass a measure with two thirds of the vote, and then that has to be ratified by three quarters of all states. The process has only gone through 17 times out of more than ten thousand proposals.
Opinion writers at the Times have called for the repeal of the second amendment before, but Stevens became the most prominent voice to make that call.