GOP shies away from action on bump stocks

Ryan, others hope ATF acts to regulate the device used in Las Vegas attack

WASHINGTON» House Speaker Paul Ryan backed away Wednesday from legislative action to ban “bump stocks,” the device a mass shooter used in Las Vegas this month to create machine-gun-like rapid fire from his legal semiautomatic rifle, killing 58.

Instead, Ryan and many fellow House Republicans hope, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives will act administratively to outlaw the devices, which the agency previously ruled to be legal in 2010.

“We think the regulatory fix is the smartest, quickest fix, and then, frankly, we’d like to know how it happened in the first place,” Ryan, R-Wis., told reporters Wednesday. He did not discuss pursuing legislation to address the issue.

Ryan made his remarks a day after 20 bipartisan House members backed a bill to ban bump stocks and similar devices meant to accelerate the firing rate of semiautomatic rifles.

The bill, led by Rep. Carlos Curbelo, RFla., and Seth Moulton, D-Mass., would make it illegal to manufacture, own or transfer any device that “is designed and functions to increase the rate of fire of a semiautomatic rifle but does not convert the semiautomatic rifle into a machinegun.”

Fully automatic machine guns, which fire off multiple rounds with a single pull of the trigger, are much more tightly regulated than semiautomatic weapons under federal law, and guns of that type manufactured after 1986 are generally illegal to own. Bump stocks avoid those restrictions by utilizing a semiautomatic weapon’s recoil to repeatedly engage the trigger.

Curbelo said Tuesday that administrative action alone would not solve the issue, noting that ATF previously ruled the devices should not be regulated like machine guns.

“If they were to get sued after changing that interpretation, the plaintiffs would have a very strong case given the agency’s previous determinations,” he said. “So if people agree with banning these devices, let’s pass a law. It’s the best way to make sure it gets done.”

Ryan’s comments Wednesday went somewhat further than his comments last Thursday, shortly after the National Rifle Association issued a statement saying that bump stocks ought to be more tightly restricted and that ATF ought to revisit its prior rulings.