President Joe Biden appeared on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” Wednesday night to discuss the recent string of mass shootings in the U.S., including one in Uvalde, Texas, which left 19 elementary school children and two teachers dead.
During the conversation, Kimmel asks Biden: “Can’t you issue an executive order? Trump passed those out like Halloween candy.”
In response, Biden said that he doesn’t want to “emulate Trump’s abuse of the constitution” by issuing many executive orders. “I have issued executive orders, within the power of the presidency, to be able to deal with these — everything having to do with guns, gun ownership — all the things within my power,” Biden said. “But what I don’t want to do, and I’m not being facetious, is emulate Trump’s abuse of the constitution and constitutional authority.”
Biden continued, “I often get asked, ‘Look, the Republicans don’t play it square, why do you play it square?’ Well, guess what? If we do the same thing they do, our democracy would literally be in jeopardy. It’s not a joke.”
Biden’s last in-person appearance on a late night talk show was in September of 2019, where he was a guest on “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” during his campaign for the democratic presidential primary. In December of 2021, President Biden served as a guest on NBC’s “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” though his conversation was a video interview and he did not visit the production’s studio. Tonight, Biden joined Kimmel at the show’s production studio in Los Angeles’ El Capitan Entertainment Centre on Hollywood Boulevard.
Watch the full conversation below.