WASHINGTON — Congress on Wednesday sent President Trump legislation to block an Obama-era rule designed to keep guns from certain mentally disabled people.
On a 57-43 vote, the Senate backed the resolution, one of several steps by the Republican-led Congress to undo regulations implemented by Barack Obama when he was president. The House had passed the measure earlier this year. The White House has signaled that Trump will sign the legislation.
The Obama rule would have prevented an estimated 75,000 people with mental disorders from being able to purchase a firearm. It was crafted as part of Obama’s effort to strengthen federal background checks following the 2012 massacre of 20 students and six staff at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.
The Obama administration rule required the Social Security Administration to report beneficiaries with mental impairments who have a third party manage their benefits. But lawmakers, with backing of the National Rifle Association and advocacy groups for the disabled, opposed the rule.
With a Republican ally in the White House, the GOP has moved aggressively to rescind some of the Obama administration’s final regulations on the environment, financial reporting, and guns.
Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, spearheaded the repeal effort and said the regulation unfairly stigmatizes the disabled and infringes on their constitutional right to bear arms. He said the mental disorders covered by the regulation are filled with ‘‘vague characteristics that do not fit into the federal mentally defective standard’’ prohibiting someone from buying or owning a gun.
Grassley cited eating and sleep disorders as examples.
Senator Chris Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut, asked, “If you can’t manage your own financial affairs, how can we expect that you’re going to be a responsible steward of a dangerous, lethal firearm?’’
The American Civil Liberties Union criticized the rule, too, saying it advanced a harmful stereotype that people with mental disabilities are violent.
