New York Gov. Kathy Hochul called for a national Red Flag law, which would seize guns of people deemed to be a danger to themselves or others, as well as a national assault weapons ban in the wake of Wednesday’s school shooting at a high school in Georgia that killed four and wounded several others.

New York has had a version of a Red Flag law, known formally as the Extreme Risk Protection Order law, which was passed in 2019 and expanded in 2022, and aims to prevent those who show signs of being a threat to themselves or others from purchasing or having firearms. Nearly two dozen other states have similar laws on the books.

“That should be a national policy. There should be a national Red Flag law or extreme risk order of protection,” Hochul said Thursday visiting a school in Syracuse to sign education-related legislation into law. “We have issued over 20,000 in the state of New York in the last two years. That's up from about a thousand before we changed the law and put the onus on law enforcement to really engage and be held responsible for taking the steps necessary.”

There have been several efforts to pass a version of a Red Flag law in Congress. Former Republican U.S. Rep. John Katko, who represented New York’s former 24th Congressional District until 2022, introduced a Red Flag bill in 2018 following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida. House Democrats in 2022 passed a bill saying a judge could issue an order to temporarily remove and store the firearms until a hearing can be held, but that failed to pass the Senate.

The suspect in the Georgia shooting, a 14-year-old boy, was interviewed in May 2023 by a sheriff's investigator from nearby Jackson County who received a tip from the FBI that the boy "had possibly threatened to shoot up a middle school tomorrow." The boy has denied making those threats.

Hochul on Thursday also called for a national assault weapons ban.

“We had one in place. We'll never know how many lives could’ve been saved because we have them so readily accessible where an 18-year-old in New York State could walk into a store and buy it on his birthday,” Hochul said. “We have to regain our sensibilities here in America. We really do. And that's why I'm calling for national action. I know that the Biden-Harris administration wants to do more. I know that the Senate, led by Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, wants to do more. And I'm calling on the Republican-led House Representatives to stop putting up roadblocks to saving children's lives.”

Before Wednesday’s shooting, there had been 29 mass killings in the U.S. so far this year, according to a database maintained by The Associated Press and USA Today in partnership with Northeastern University.