On if the bill is working:

I don't think there's a question whether it's working. It is. 

We’ve seen hundreds of gun-trafficking prosecutions. We’ve seen nearly 1,000 young people be denied weapons under the new background check system. We’ve seen a 50 percent increase in the number of enforcement actions against unlicensed gun dealers. But most importantly, there’s something going on out there in 2023 that’s leading to a lower murder rate in the biggest cities across the country, and I think the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act has something to do with it. 

On how he thinks the BSCA is reducing murders in big cities:

Two hundred prosecutions of gun-trafficking rings is not a small thing. We have taken a lot of weapons away from domestic abusers and we’ve spent a lot of money already. There's a lot of urban-based anti-gun violence organizations that have double or triple the budget this year than they had last year. 

On if there have been implementation challenges:

The primary implementation challenge is also an opportunity. The enhanced background check on younger buyers allows for NICS (the National Instant Criminal Background Check System) to gather juvenile records. It also requires a phone call to the police department. Many states don't yet allow those juvenile records to be shared. And so we are going to be in a constant process of trying to convince states to share more of those records. 

The phone call to the police department is perhaps the most important part of the law, because it alerts the police department that there's a young person that they may know to be in crisis sitting at a gun store, waiting to buy an assault weapon. But for that version to be effective, the police department has to have a process to do something with the phone call they're getting.

The House GOP budget released by the conservative Republican Study Committee this week calls for the defunding of money for red-flag grants to states. On whether that $750 million allocation could be defunded this year:

I don’t worry about that. I think there is strong, proud support for that provision in the Senate among Republicans and Democrats. I don't think any of the 15 Republicans who supported the bill last year in the Senate would support stripping out any of the money from the bill. 

• (We asked Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), the top Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee who voted for the bill, if she'd support stripping that funding. “That's certainly not something that I would support,” she said.)

On what he wants to hear from the president today:  

I hope the president spends some time talking about how well this law is working and how it likely is reducing violent crime rates in this country. 

I think it’s important for the movement to hear that, because, you know, there were certainly people who didn’t think what we did was enough, or wanted us to hold out until we could pass everything all at once. But, you know, our theory was that saving even a couple thousand lives was worth it, and getting Republicans socialized to the idea that there's a political benefit in voting for changes in gun laws was critical as well. 

So, I know the president’s going to talk about ending assault weapons and comprehensive background checks — he’s always looking to the future — but I hope he spends a bunch of time walking through the data on how this bill is working.

On why people still don’t feel safe: 

Mass shootings are not dropping.  And I do think that until we pass a ban on assault weapons, it's possible we're not going to make the kind of progress we run on mass shootings.

On what legislation comes next for the gun-safety movement:

I don't know. 

This is a really awful issue in which Republicans are generally not willing to really engage or show their cards until something really terrible and macabre has happened somewhere in the country. But what I have figured out is that you have to be constantly talking to Republicans about what’s possible, about what they might support before those moments arise. And so I’ve continued to talk to Republicans about expanding the number of background checks that are done in the country [and] different ways to be more careful about selling assault weapons — though, maybe, short of a ban. And, you know, maybe the moment will come sometime this year, or next year, when we can assemble the same kind of coalition we did last summer.

We surveyed some of the 15 Republican senators who joined all Democrats supporting the measure last year to see whether they've received any political blowback from constituents since then. 

Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.), a lead sponsor of the bill, said, “When I’m flying back home or visiting with people, I get more 'thank yous' than anything else because people understand what a polarizing issue that can be, but they want something done.”

Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) said she did get pushback from her constituents in West Virginia but it's “becoming less and less of an issue every day.”

• “It has actually resulted in some people who shouldn’t have guns not getting them. So I’m hanging my hat on that,” Capito said. 

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) said the feedback he's gotten has been “very positive.”