Cory Booker’s Gun Control Plan Calls for National Licensing Program

Mr. Sanders saw his record on gun control come under scrutiny when he faced off with Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination for president in 2016. He was criticized for, among other things, having supported a 2005 bill that gave gun manufacturers legal immunity, but he has since changed his position on that issue.

That bill, the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, is a specific target of Mr. Booker’s plan. In his announcement Monday, Mr. Booker said that if elected president, he would repeal it.

“Senator Booker’s plan is bold and thoughtful,” said Peter Ambler, the executive director of Giffords, the gun violence prevention organization led by former Representative Gabrielle Giffords. He added that it was a “positive sign” that presidential candidates were “coming to the table with serious policy proposals to make our country safer.”

Mr. Booker has focused a significant portion of his platform on a topic connected to gun control: criminal justice reform. He and Ms. Harris seek to compete with Mr. Biden for support from African-Americans, who are disproportionately affected by gun violence and incarcerated at significantly higher rates than white Americans.

Mr. Booker has often cited his time as the mayor of Newark when discussing his firsthand experience with those issues. In an interview that aired Sunday on CNN, he drew on that experience again, standing on a Newark street corner where he said a man who once lived with him had been fatally shot by a gunman wielding an assault rifle.

Speaking about gun violence, he said, “I am going to come at this like folks have never seen before.”

John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, an advocacy organization that seeks to end gun violence, said he had seen a “seismic shift” from past campaigns, when the issue of gun violence was considered the “third rail” of American politics.

“Today what we’re seeing is people coming out muscularly for gun safety,” Mr. Feinblatt said. “We’re early on in the 2020 cycle, and I think you’re going to see more and more of this.”