Gun-Grabbing Democrats Vote to Ban ‘Assault-Style’ Weapons

House Democrats voted to make it “illegal to sell, manufacture, transfer, possess or import” certain “assault-style” weapons on Friday. The most popular rifle in America, the ArmaLite 15 — also known as a AR 15 — would be included in the ban. 

Almost every Democrat — including Tim Ryan, Kim Schrier, Elaine Luria, and Dan Kildee — joined Nancy Pelosi and progressives in supporting the ban. Republicans slammed the vote as an assault on Americans’ Second Amendment rights.

The New York Times: Republicans argued that AR-15-style weapons are popular sporting rifles that law-abiding citizens use for self-defense and hunting. And they dismissed the assault weapons bill as an attempt by liberals to trample on gun rights while doing nothing to address the root causes of crime.

“Let’s call this for what it is: It’s a gun grab, pure and simple,” said Representative Guy Reschenthaler, Republican of Pennsylvania. “This bill is not about public safety. Rather, this is the most severe restriction on the Second Amendment since the passage of the assault weapons ban of 1994.”

Republicans also criticized the ban as an ineffective way to combat the wave of violent crime Democrats in large cities enabled. Fewer than three percent of homicides are committed by weapons Democrats’ gun-grabbing bill would ban.

Additionally the bill — known as the Assault Weapons Ban of 2022 — is misleadingly named. No legally-owned civilian firearm is an “assault rifle as the term is used in military contexts.”

Bottom Line: Soft-on-crime prosecutors and progressive criminal justice reforms are responsible for skyrocketing rates of violent crime. Democrats’ assault on the Second Amendment will not fix the problems they created.