Maine legislature passes sweeping gun safety laws in all-night session
Maine’s state legislature approved sweeping gun safety legislation including background checks on private gun sales, waiting periods for gun purchases and criminalizing gun sales to prohibited people before adjourning on Thursday morning, nearly six months after the deadliest shooting in state history.
The Democratic governor, Janet Mills, and the Democratic-led legislature pressed for a number of gun and mental health proposals after the shooting that claimed 18 lives and injured another 13 people, despite the state’s strong hunting tradition and support for gun owners.
“Maine has taken significant steps forward in preventing gun violence and protecting Maine lives,” said Nacole Palmer, executive director of the Maine Gun Safety Coalition, who praised lawmakers for listening to their constituents.
The governor’s bill, approved early on Thursday, would strengthen the state’s yellow flag law, boost background checks for private sales of guns and make it a crime to recklessly sell a gun to someone who is prohibited from having guns. The bill also funds violence prevention initiatives and opens a mental health crisis receiving center in Lewiston.
The Maine senate also narrowly gave final approval on Wednesday to a 72-hour waiting period for gun purchases and a ban on bump stocks that can transform a weapon into a machine gun.
However, there was no action on a proposal to institute a “red flag” law. The bill sponsored by the house speaker, Rachel Talbot Ross, would have allowed family members to petition a judge to remove guns from someone who is in a psychiatric crisis. The state’s current “yellow flag” law differs by putting police in the lead of the process, which critics say is too complicated.
Lawmakers pushed through the night and into the morning as they ran up against their adjournment date, which was Wednesday. But it did not come without some 11th-hour drama.
Lawmakers had to approve a contentious supplemental budget before casting their final votes and did not wrap up the session until after daybreak.
A 25 October mass shooting by an army reservist in Lewiston, Maine’s second-largest city, served as tragic backdrop for the legislative session.
Police were warned by family members that the shooter was becoming delusional and had access to weapons. He was hospitalized for two weeks while training with his unit last summer. And his best friend, a fellow reservist, warned that the man was going “to snap and do a mass shooting”. The shooter killed himself after the attack.
Democrats said constituents implored them to do something to prevent future attacks. They said it would have been an abdication of their responsibility to ignore their pleas.
“For the sake of the communities, individuals and families now suffering immeasurable pain, for the sake of our state, doing nothing is not an option,” the governor said in late January when she outlined her proposals in her state of the state address. Those in attendance responded with a standing ovation.