President Donald Trump confirmed Monday morning that his administration no longer defended the idea of ​​banning the sale of semi-automatic rifles to citizens under 21 years, as he had advanced yet ten days ago .

The abandonment of this measure demanded by students at Parkland High School in Florida, where a 19-year-old gunman shot 17 people with an assault rifle on February 14, came out in broad daylight on Sunday. The White House has published a list of proposals to prevent such tragedies from happening again.

In a series of tweets published Monday morning, the US president has raised several reasons for this flip-flop, strongly criticized by many elected Democrats and advocates for better gun control.

“On the age limit of 18 to 21, you have to watch the cases before the courts and the judgments before acting. States make this type of decision. Things are moving fast on this, but there is not much political support (to say the least),” he said.

Ten minutes earlier, he had defended the proposals published Sunday night by the White House. “Strong improvements and stronger security checks will have the full support of the White House. Bills are moving forward,” he said.

“The sticks with shot accelerators ( bump stocks ), it will be finished soon . Highly trained expert teachers will be allowed to carry concealed weapons ( conceal-carry ), subject to state laws. Armed guardians are OK. Dissuasive,” he added.

Two weeks after the Parkland massacre, however, President Trump had publicly declared that he was open to raising the minimum age requirement for an assault rifle in the United States during a meeting with Congressional representatives at the White House.

“You can not buy a handgun if you are 18, 19, 20 years old. You must wait until you are 21 years old. You can buy the weapon used in this terrible slaughter at 18 years old. You are essentially going to decide who you are in this room. I would think about it seriously. ”

“The NRA [National Rifle Association] is opposed to this, and I am a supporter of the NRA,” he added. “Great patriots. They love our country, but that does not mean we have to agree on everything. It does not make sense that I have to wait until I’m 21 to get a handgun, but 18 for that weapon.

The ban on selling assault weapons to citizens under the age of 21 was decided last week by the Republican-dominated Florida Congress. The NRA announced it would challenge the measure in the courts just an hour after Governor Rick Scott enacted the new law.

The proposals released Sunday evening by the White House will be studied by a federal commission to increase security in schools, which will be chaired by Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos.

This includes looking at a range of measures, including ways to arm some teachers, better deal with mental health issues, and improve the effectiveness of security checks for gun buyers. It could also look at the minimum age required to obtain certain types of firearms.

Asked about this and the retreat of Donald Trump Monday morning in an interview with NBC, Ms. DeVos was content to say that “everything is on the table” for the work of the commission, but without committing more.