WASHINGTON – Colorado U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter reintroduced a bill Tuesday that seeks to further limit gun ownership from potentially dangerous persons in a move strongly supported by a new public opinion poll.

The bill would expand prohibitions against gun possession by anyone with a history of mental illness, substance abuse or violence.

“We must do everything we can to make gun violence less easy, less frequent and less deadly, including addressing the role of mental health and other risk factors in gun violence tragedies,” Perlmutter, an Arvada Democrat, said in a statement.

Similar sentiments were found in a new NBC News-Wall Street Journal survey that showed 89% of Americans favor expanded background checks for gun purchasers on the heels of mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, that killed 31 people this month.

Nearly 80% percent back “red flag” laws to take guns away from persons identified as dangerous to themselves or others.

President Donald Trump – formerly a strong gun ownership supporter – on Wednesday said he would support broader background checks before purchases.

“There are certain weaknesses” in gun laws, Trump said during a press briefing. “We want to fix the weaknesses.”

The Safer Communities Act would award grants for mental health programs and expand records reporting on potentially dangerous persons into the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS). The system launched by the FBI in 1998 requires gun shop owners to do instant background checks on their customers.

Perlmutter was joined in introducing the bill in Congress by Rep. Mike Thompson, a California Democrat. Thompson is chairman of the House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force and Perlmutter is the vice chairman.

The Democrat-controlled House of Representatives approved one gun control bill to broaden background checks before its summer recess in July. The Republican-controlled Senate is expected to take up gun-control legislation this fall now that Trump has signaled his support for it.

“Americans are ready for action,” Perlmutter said.

Requiring the FBI to expand its NICS alert system would make it easier for state and local law enforcement to keep guns away from anyone who has been involuntarily committed to outpatient mental health treatment, Perlmutter said. Current law prohibits guns sales only to inpatient commitments.

Thompson described the Safer Communities Act as “a comprehensive approach to improving the submission of mental health records into the background check system.”

The bill also authorizes grants for states to temporarily remove firearms from persons a court determines might pose a significant threat to themselves or others.

Perlmutter and Thompson introduced the bill on the same day police in Long Beach, Calif., arrested a Marriott Hotel cook who threatened to shoot everyone he saw when he returned to work. He was angry over a human resources dispute.

Police seized several high-powered firearms from the disgruntled cook’s home. They included an assault rifle, 38 high-capacity magazines and hundreds of rounds of ammunition.

Perlmutter spokeswoman Ashley Verville described the Safer Communities Act as a version of a red flag law, also known as an extreme risk protection order, similar to the one recently approved by the Colorado general assembly.

“Other federal legislation issues new grants, whereas this bill authorizes states to use grants they are already receiving for law enforcement to implement their own [extreme risk protection orders],” Verville told Colorado Politics.

Perlmutter is scheduled to speak Monday during a debate on gun violence in Aurora. Colorado U.S. Reps. Jason Crow and Joe Neguse also plan to attend the 7 p.m. event at the Aurora Association of Realtors office.

Perlmutter has been close to gun violence previously. He represented Aurora during the 2012 Aurora theater shooting and served in a state senate district near the 1999 Columbine school shooting.

The public outcry in favor of stricter gun control also is drawing warnings from pro-gun lobbyists and organizations such as the National Rifle Association. They are renewing messages that carry the theme that if guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns.