President Trump expressed interest in rebuilding mental institutions while responding to questions about the recent mass shootings on Thursday.
“We can’t let these people be on the streets,” Trump said on his way to a campaign rally in New Hampshire. Answering questions about various topics including gun control legislation, the president asserted, “We’re looking at the whole gun situation. I do want people to remember the words ‘mental illness,’ these people are mentally ill.”
Trump then took the opportunity to share possible solutions to mental illness in the U.S., which he believes play a key role in violent gun attacks. “And nobody talks about that, but these are mentally ill people … I think we have to start building institutions again,” he suggested. “If you look at the ’60s and ’70s, so many of these institutions were closed, and the people were just allowed to go onto the streets, and that was a terrible thing for our country.”
Discussing why state-run mental facilities declined, the president said, “Cities couldn’t afford them, and they closed them. I can tell you in New York they closed a lot of them, and the people went out, they went out onto the streets.”
“A lot of our conversation has to do with the fact that we have to open up institutions. We can’t let these people be on the streets,” Trump concluded.