The Middletown Press (Middletown, CT)
Door open for bump-stock ban
Some in GOP willing to look at gun modification
WASHINGTON — A move to ban bump stock devices is accelerating in Congress, with some Republicans joining Connecticut’s two senators and other Democrats in calling for scrutiny of the add-on the Las Vegas shooter used to turn single-shot rifles into machine guns.
And in a major surprise, the National Rifle Association said Thursday the devices “should be subject to additional regulations.”
Also Thursday, House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., a staunch gun-rights supporter, said the legality of bump stock is “something that we need to look into.”
Asked about bump stock controls, White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said “we’re certainly open to having that conversation.”
On Wednesday, a slew of Republican senators including John Cornyn, RTexas, Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., Orrin Hatch, RUtah, and Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said they, too, were open to bump stock controls.
Connecticut’s Democratic lawmakers are used to mass shootings, such as Newtown in 2012, being met by resistance from Republicans — and some Democrats — to any new gun laws.
After the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting that took the lives of 20 children and six adult staff members, the Democraticcontrolled Senate in 2013 fell six votes short of overcoming a filibuster against universal background checks.
A different reaction
Few in Washington expected a different reaction after Las Vegas shooter Stephen Paddock used an arsenal of 18 weapons to spray fire Sunday at a country music festival, killing 58 and wounding more than 500 before he died.
But lawmakers of both parties have keyed in on Paddock’s possession of 12 bump stock devices, which enabled him to up the death toll by turning his single-trigger-pull, semiautomatic rifles into weapons that imitate machine guns.
“This does feel different,” said Sen. Chris Murphy, who along with fellow Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal and other Democrats held the Senate floor for nearly 15 hours last year to force ultimately unsuccessful gun-law votes in the wake of the Pulse nightclub mass shooting in Orlando.
“I’m glad Republicans are open to regulation of these devices,” Murphy said.
He and Blumenthal cosponsored legislation introduced Wednesday by Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., that would ban the sale, possession and importation of bump-stock devices.
“It’s still a long uphill road,” said Blumenthal. Nevertheless, he added, he was “surprised” by Republicans, “because their standard, knee-jerk reaction is implacable opposition.”
Rep. Elizabeth Esty, DConn., who represents Newtown and serves as vice chair of the Democratic House Gun Violence Prevention Task Force, said: “I’m happy to see progress of any sort. I think we have a decent possibility of getting this passed, because bump stock is so outrageous.”
The president of Connecticut’s leading gunrights organization, the Connecticut Citizens Defense League, said he was wary of any calls for new gun laws in the aftermath of mass shootings.
“Our concern as an organization is that bans on inanimate objects always lead to more bans on other items,” said Scott Wilson. “It never seems to end.”
A nuanced distinction
Machine guns were subject to strict regulation in 1934 and banned outright in 1986, with the exception of weapons made before the law’s effective date.
Later Thursday, Ryan suggested bump stocks might be subject to a regulatory solution rather than a legislative one.
“Fully automatic weapons have been outlawed for many, many years,” Ryan said. “This seems to be a way of going around that. So obviously we need to look at how we can tighten up the compliance with this law so that fully automatic weapons are banned.”
The NRA and some Republican House members said it was up to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives to evaluate bump stocks and make sure they comply with these laws.
ATF agents test-fired the devices and judged them by the government’s legal standard: A rifle that discharges a single bullet with each trigger pull is legal; a rifle that discharges a burst of bullets with each trigger pull is not.
Because bump-stock devices harness the natural recoil of a rifle discharge to chamber additional rounds and send forth a paroxysm of fire, the ATF determined they met the single-trigger-pull standard.
“We don’t take a position on whether we like an item or don’t like an item,” ATF senior firearms enforcement officer Max Kingery said in a 2013 interview with Hearst Newspapers at the bureau’s facility in Martinsburg, W. Va. “We simply classify it according to the law.”
Blumenthal characterized the NRA call for ATF re-examination of the devices as a delaying tactic.
“It’s a deceptive and dangerous dodge,” he said, noting that federal rule making often takes years. “It’s a really sinister tactic to distract from the need for a law banning bump stocks.”