WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama says the Senate's opposition to a bill that would have expanded background checks for gun buyers marks a "shameful day for Washington." He says a minority of senators decided "it wasn't worth it" to protect the nation's children.
Obama spoke in the Rose Garden shortly after the Senate vote. It marked a major blow to the gun control push Obama started in the wake of December's shooting at a Newtown, Conn., elementary school.
The president pinned the blame for the measures failure on the Republican minority, though five Democrats also opposed the plan.
Obama was introduced by the father of a 7-year-old killed in the shooting. Other families joined him in the Rose Garden, along with former Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, who was shot in the head in 2011.
