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Dayton Urges Lawmakers To Pass Stand-Alone Gun Safety Bill

MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- State leaders are making a last ditch effort to pass gun reform legislation before lawmakers wrap up and head home.

Gov. Mark Dayton wants a law on the books that would require universal background checks on gun sales in our state.

Dayton appeared on Friday morning alongside more than a dozen local students who attended the March for Life in Washington, D.C. last month.

Wearing orange shirts, they pleaded alongside Dayton for lawmakers to pass his Safe and Secure Schools Act, which would allow schools to make safety improvements and to hire additional student support staff.

Dayton also reiterated his support for other legislation aimed at reducing gun violence, like universal background checks and the clarification of a bump fire stocks ban.

"Minnesotans are still awaiting final legislative action on policies that would make our schools safer," Dayton said. "I have asked you again and again to send these essential school safety provisions in a stand-alone bill; yet my requests have been ignored."

Earlier this week, two Republican lawmakers introduced measures that would encourage private gun sales to go through background checks and would tighten gun access for people convicted of domestic assault. It's unclear what the future will hold for those two proposals.

If lawmakers do want to pass any of these measures, they will need to act fast. There are just more than two weeks left in this year's session and there is still a lot left of the table besides this issue that lawmakers need to take care of.

This push for gun safety in Minnesota comes as President Donald Trump is scheduled to speak in front of the NRA. He is likely to highlight his support for the second amendment and steps taken on gun safety this year.

This comes as the issue of gun violence takes on new urgency following one of the deadliest school shootings in U.S. history. Seventeen people were killed in February during the Parkland Florida shooting.

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