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BREAKING: Diane Feinstein Introduces Bill to Ban Bump Fire Stocks

Dan Zimmerman - comments No comments

What took her so long? California Senator Diane Feinstein’s had almost three days, and now she’s announced the inevitable…a bill to ban bump fire stocks.

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, a longtime advocate of stricter gun control measures, introduced a bill Wednesday that would ban the sale and possession of bump-stock equipment and other devices that essentially turn a semiautomatic weapon into an automatic one.

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) told reporters Tuesday that multiple bump stocks were found in the hotel room used by the shooter, who opened fire during the Route 91 Harvest Music Festival on Sunday, killing 58 people and injuring over 500 others.

Here’s the relevant language from the bill:

Except as provided in paragraph (2), on and after the date that is 180 days after the date of enactment of this subsection, it shall be unlawful for any person to import, sell, manufacture, transfer, or possess, in or af- fecting interstate or foreign commerce, a trigger crank, a bump-fire device, or any part, combination of parts, component, device, attachment, or accessory that is de- signed or functions to accelerate the rate of fire of a semi- automatic rifle but not convert the semiautomatic rifle into a machinegun.

Again, the ATF deemed bump fire stocks to be legal firearm accessories about six years ago. Feinstein’s bill would not only prohibit bump fire stock sales to the public, but would outlaw their possession. That means tens…maybe hundreds of thousands of the items would have to be turned in or destroyed. Here we go.

 

0 thoughts on “BREAKING: Diane Feinstein Introduces Bill to Ban Bump Fire Stocks”

  1. There’s a lot of attention focused on the bumpfire stock now that we know the LV a*hole had 12 guns equipped with them. It’s important to note that bumpfire stocks have been around since 2010, and bumpfire by itself (or with the help of a rubber band) has been around probably since the inception of semi-auto firearms, yet we have seen no crimes committed with bumpfire stocks (or rubber bands) until now. If indeed these are such effective lethal tools, you would think that they’d be used more often. They have not, because as Nick & RF have said, they’re novelties and gimmicky toys, they don’t have much practical use.

    The other thing to keep in mind is that the shooter had 12 minutes between the time of the first shot and when the cops ran upstairs. While I don’t have an accurate count from authorities of how many rounds were fired, I will guarantee that any regular semi-auto rifle could have done just about as much damage given 12 unfettered minutes. Hell, even noobs can do a 30 round mag dump in about 30 seconds on a stock AR15, and a 3 second mag change later continue on. With 12 minutes, a noob can probably unleash at least 700 rounds, and probably much more if they decided to press the trigger faster. Yes, a bumpfire stock can sure fire more rounds than a stock AR in about 10 seconds — but given 12 minutes, I don’t see much of a difference. That’s why even in the case of Orlando, when only a semi-auto was used, you had nearly as high of a death count as you did in LV.

    You also have to think of this in terms of legalese. Currently the reason why bumpfire stocks are legal is that they don’t alter the mechanism for firing the gun — it doesn’t change a semi-auto because technically you still need to pull the trigger each time to fire a bullet. Yes, there are some “additional aids” such as that motorized glove, and adding a spring in your bumpstock which would raise the ire of the ATF, but the bumpfire stock is just a piece of plastic that with no other moving components. As others have shown, you can bump fire with a rubber band, or hell, just by holding the gun in a precise way. A bumpfire stock ban wouldn’t get rid of several other ways to simulate fast fire.

    What I fear is that the language of any proposals to ban bumpfire stocks would be so broad and encompassing (because, they usually ARE) that it would ban any mechanism that would “increase the rate of fire” — and this would include legitimate tools for gun folks like drop-in triggers, reduced power springs, etc. Because anyone who thinks this is just about bumpfire stocks hasn’t been paying attention to the gun-grabber’s for these last 30 years.

    That’s why bumpfire stock is a red herring. Antis want to focus on it now since that is what was used in LV. But what the antis really want are bans and confiscations of as many types of guns as possible. The bumpfire stock is just an excuse. All you have to do is look at California, New Jersey, and Massachussetts to see what giving one inch will lead to.

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  2. Given the obvious constraints, I think you got it right. The most important thing you said—essential I think you making your argument work—is that gun control measures are a distraction. Gun control advocates are far more interested in using law to underscore their valued beliefs than they are in achieving their stated interests in “stopping gun-violence”, etc., etc. Basically, they’re interested in symbolism—the “cause”, be it gun-control, speed-limits, or pornography simply provides the stage on which they present their drama.

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  3. Good on you guys for recording the entire interview. Way to beat these jokers at their own game. Now if we could just get Fox News or even James Okeefe for some undercover exposure! Way to go guys!

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  4. I just read two stories in which mothers killed their children, NO guns used. So now what? Where is the call for knife and blunt object control? Where are the late night know-it-all comedian outrage and answers? Where is Pelosi, Schumer, FiDi? I can’t find a peep from them or any other elite. HUMM does not fit their control freak agenda I guess.

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  5. Congress can pass all the laws it wants to with regard to banning guns, magazines or accessories (such as bump-fire stocks), but since most of these items are not registered or “on the government’s books”, good luck with the compliance rate on that.

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  6. As an owner of a bump fire stock…. I yield to Amendment #5 of the Constitution:

    No person shall …
    be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law

    QED this is an unconstitutional bill. Not that it has stopped Congress before….

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  7. It’s short, overly simplistic, devoid of any specific solutions, and provides no actual facts for the editors to dispute. I love it. Perfect for USA Today’s audience who probably arent going to read the actual editorial in it’s entirety anyway.

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  8. “…We have to improve economic and educational opportunities for inner city youth….”

    Here we go; more time and money wasted on affirmative action programs that do nothing to affect hearts and minds of people unwilling to change or accept responsibility for their own actions. Works every time (sarc off now).

    “… work to identify threats before they’re realized….”

    Will definitely work– we can institutionalize every person deemed a ‘threat’ by liberal doctors with no agenda in mind. Works every time (sarc off).

    “…we have to focus on a range of effective solutions….”

    Of course, gun owners and those wanting to be can surely accept more restrictions on their freedoms while getting nothing in return. Oh, wait– they will get less freedom in return, and that’s a ‘win-win’ for everyone (sarc off now).

    Statistics aren’t needed to get across the point that tractor-trailer rigs don’t need bullets and would probably have cost less than what this murderer spent on firearms and ammunition. For thousands of dollars less and probably much fewer problems could have built an IED and wiped massacred even more than he did. How much would it have cost him to locate and purchase an aspirin bottle full of ricin (sp?) and disperse same among the crowd?

    That said, I don’t see anything really ‘wrong’ with your response, such as it is. The real problem is going to be with those who read both (fat chance) articles and utilize common sense and rational thought– ‘ain’t’ gonna happen, Robert.

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  9. Slippery slope argument. A minimal amount of training will enable an average shooter to achieve extended, rapid, magazine emptying rates of fire that come close to that achieved by a bump-stock. Imposing mechanical restrictions on semi-automatic weapons is a dead-end argument that always depends on flawed lets-do-it-for-the-kids moral appeals for legitimacy.

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  10. Well done. Of course repeat offenders, inner city youth, veterans, and poverty had nothing to do with Paddock’s (I believe) politically motivated slaughter of those who’s politics he disagreed most with, but you threw USA Today an important bone – one that is hard for them to argue against, because a) it really has nothing to do with the facts of this particular circumstance, and b) it somewhat aligns with, and fits their narrow and irrational narratives.

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  11. Wouldn’t this also eliminate the entire aftermarket trigger manufacturing business as well? One could easily argue that a smoother lighter trigger would function to accelerate the rate of fire. And what’s next, things that make guns more accurate like scopes and pods?

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  12. “…any part, combination of parts, component, device, attachment, or accessory that is designed or functions to accelerate the rate of fire of a semiautomatic rifle”

    Actually, as written, this bill would make triggers like the Geissele S3G illegal to posess. (Nevermind the Echo, 3MR or Franklin Binary). “Accelerate” is a relative term. Accelerate from what? Stock triggers? I’m guessing that’s how it would be interpreted — What if the “semiautomatic rifle” starts out with a certain “rate of fire”? Then no acceleration would have occurred. Not sure how this could be enforced.

    (LE/GOV carve-out of course.)

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  13. I knew bump fire stocks and binary triggers were going to be a bad idea once the democrats saw how they worked. Those fucking idiots were trying to put the screws on outlawing silencers but they didn’t even mention bump stocks. Apparently that’s over now.

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  14. I think you did the best you could given the circumstances. I also liked the piece you did for CBS. I think you are trying like hell for the rest of us to produce a relatable individual for the non gunners to see. USA Today has never been friendly to the POTG. That will probably never change. And the deck is stacked against you if they get to see your piece before they get to see their piece. They will probably hang you out to dry as a “right wing gun nut”. That being said i think that you are a prime example of a rational gun owner. The ones they dont want to talk about. You write these stories about how our rights are infringed again and again. But i have not once detected a sense of anger that could be perceived as dangerous. You are a reasonable person with logic behind you. Godspeed RF

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  15. A 30 round magazine allows me to increase my rate of fire per minute over a five round magazine. Would they use that as a legal open door to go after higher capacity magazines? The way it is written, you certainly could make the argument.

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  16. I would have mentioned the 89 people killed and hundreds wounded on 13 November 2015 at the Bataclan Theatre in Paris, France, where guns are heavily regulated and the automatic weapons used by the killers were certainly verboten. Proof that evil people ignore laws and acquire whatever weapons they think they need.

    I would have mentioned the 86 people killed and hundreds injured on 14 July 2016 in Nice, France, by a killer driving a rented truck. Proof that evil people are more imaginative than governments and will use whatever tools and methods they think will do the job.

    Ban all guns in the U.S. and it won’t prevent either of those atrocities from happening here. Confronting evil by attempting to regulate their tools of choice is a fools errand that does more harm than good.

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  17. On and after the date that is 180 days after the date of enactment of this subsection, it shall be unlawful for any person to actuate the trigger or other firing mechanism of any firearm without first, and at every subsequent actuation thereafter, verbally exclaiming, in such a way appropriate to the environment as to be audible over background noise, “One Mississippi, Two Mississippi, Three Mississippi!”

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  18. These people believe it does work, though. It’s almost an article of faith for them. Maybe they can’t emotionally deal with the helplessness they feel if they admit this point? I dunno. But either way they start from the false premise that .gov solution is best solution and work from there. All evidence to the contrary notwithstanding.

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  19. Mmot just trigger Replacements, but wouldn’t this cover recoil springs to? As your spring wears out your rate of fire slows down however imperceptively. or even just replacing that heavy-duty Factory recoil spring with one that’s a little lighter. and would this affect bolt action rifles to? I just had to replace the recoil spring in my Lee-Enfield bolt and you can definitely feel a difference in the snap

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  20. Because we had a much of greedy Morons (Founding Fathers) running the Government we had an unnecessary war which resulted in us missing out on a Parliamentary Government which gave us a Representative Corrupt sham democracy and a ridiculous Constitution written in stone that for all practical purposes is almost impossible to change especially in these divisive times. As a consequence of all this we now have a Government run by corruption and often times heavily influenced by popular opinion not by common sense. The Supreme Court is a dictatorship pure and simple and beholding to no one except an angry public. The Courts have become the only way any Constitutional changes can be made due to our ridiculous two party system of extremes so most of the time its done by simply ignoring the Constitution as though it does not exist.

    The Second Amendment was made during a time when we only had 3 million people not over 300 million people as we have today. In those times if there had been full auto weapons or even semi-auto’s with bump fire stocks do you really think the Assholes that were in power then would have given the people the right to own such weapons? The answer is no because that of course would have threatened their power because with such weapons they would have realized that only a few hundred people could have threatened their power over everyone.

    Today we have the added problem of more mentally ill people than we have ever had it the country’s history. We have a declining way of life with less and less high paying jobs for the common worker. We have high divorce rates that cause many young men to go off the deep end. We have both culture clashes and ethnic hatreds between the far left and far right. We have a health care system that gives people next to nothing in affordable coverage which results in many people having no money for both health care and mental health care. Our health care is the most expensive in the world and gives us the least service from it. Its become so shameful that some 3rd world African countries have less child mortality than we do.

    When all these factors are taken into consideration the Second Amendment is on very fragile ground. Most Americans today do not own guns (70 per cent of the population at last count this week). More and more non gun owners view the Second Amendment and those that support it as Right Wing Nut Cases that are 10 times the danger to them in their everyday lives than any attack by a foreign army or a foreign group of terrorists and one can hardly blame them as out of all the multitudes of mass murders in the last couple of decades only two were connected to foreign people or ideology and the rest were by and large by you guessed it done by Right Wing Nut Cases with guys like Dillon Roof their hero and star poster boy waving a Confederate flag.

    All of this effects the decisions of both the lower courts and the Supreme Court who view gun ownership as a threat to their power both personally and through the bad public publicity they get if they vote pro Second Amendment on anything. It took them decades and decades to even consider hearing a meaningful case on the Second Amendment and then if it had not been for only 1 tie breaking vote by the most hated man on the court Scalia today the Second Amendment for all practical purposes would be only an illusion. Remember that it was only one vote that basically saved it then but that was then not now and Scalia is dead and gone and forgotten by the Court. If the Dems do regain power and appoint more Liberals to the Court then the Second Amendment really will not anymore have a snowballs chance in hell of being anything more than symbolic. And of course even if this does not happen the lower courts are just as much a threat to the Second Amendment as the Supreme Court is. Letting the lower Courts take the heat and then refusing to hear Second Amendment cases is something the corrupt Supreme Court has done for decades and decades and that is certainly not going to change especially with all the mass murders that have become almost a Macomb weekly form of entertainment with the News Media and a dumb founded, horrified and mesmerized public glued daily to their Social Media pages now too terrorized to go to any gathering with large crowds and they are getting more and more fed up with all the mayhem.

    With the declining gun ownership in this country even the Gun Lobby is becoming more and more impotent and the voting pro gun people less and less effective at the ballet box as well. East and West Coast States have placed so many restrictions on modern firearms that many now are illegal to own and never will be again. A Nationwide Ban is becoming more and more of a reality and if this last mass shooting had been done under a Democratic Majority several millions semi auto hand guns and rifles would already have been on their way to the smelter. Australia’s horrific pictures of thousands of guns being melted down would pale in comparison to Americas arsenal of guns as American own 40 percent of all privately owned weapons in the world while being only 30 per cent of the American population. I think any clear thinking political scientist can see where this is all going as far a future gun ownership is concerned.

    Lets face cold hard facts even the Republicans will eventually reach a point where they will no longer be able to pander to the NRA as the mass murders have become so horrific and so common no civilized society is going to put up with the mayhem much longer and their solution will be more and more bans on more and more types of weapons and the ones left for legal ownership will be so difficult and expensive to get that the common man will not be able to afford it or want to jump through all the hoops to even get one. But technically they will say you still have Second Amendment rights because after all the Founding Fathers weapons (flint lock muzzle loaders) are still legal (at least for now).

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    • crisco, I think you are uniquely qualified to tackle the mental health issue. Apparently you have been committed and are “off your meds”.

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    • OMG Billy the Frisco Kid. I so wanna believe in what you say. Why do you always screw yourself with “fake news”? Really, some of the stuff you say would make an ANTIFA blush. You started off so well. “We have a declining way of life with less and less high paying jobs for the common worker.” Yes. I agree. But then you bring up the declining gun ownership rate. “With the declining gun ownership in this country even the Gun Lobby is becoming more and more impotent and the voting pro gun people less and less effective at the ballet box as well.”
      I used to have hope for you Billy. But now I realize you’re more mentally deranged than these nut cases with “machine guns”. Please do us a favor and start taking harder drugs. You really need them.

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  21. There is no reason to defend the bump stock. It turns a semi-automatic weapon into an effectively automatic weapon.

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  22. we should not have to defend them . this was not a gun issue, this was an issue with stupidity and a total lack of security that made it easy for anyone to do something to. remember large crowds draw terrorist? any one with a bomb could have attacked or even a home made bomb rocket launcher which is quite easy to make. and would have worked well from that floor. and ammonia used to make gas could have been part of the mix. if you are going to be stupid and have things where they are easy targets then you are going to be an easy target and someone is going to take advantage of that. we need to stop being stupid and think more about security, because even in a country with no guns this will still happen. and the as####e left dems (communist) need to understand that. but no they probably make this stuff happen so they can push their communist agenga on us.

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  23. It’s long past time to introduce Feinstine to a nicely made noose and that slippery slope for the benefit of all! Notice the Socialist idiot behind her with his nose buried up her ass trying to latch on any bread crumbs of support. Now begins the rampant race to produce the most outlandish restrictive legislation proposals with all the monkeys trying to outdo each other to earn personal best awards.

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  24. Why the apology RF?!? You done good. I’m not going ANYWHERE. I’m in TTAG’s corner especially with the coverage of the gun company traitors in ILLINOIS! Or hey telling the truth about Remington’s R51…

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  25. As a former member of the same sausage-making industry, I understood the rationale for TTAG’s participating, and was glad to see “us” in the report. We need responsible portrayals in the media, and you guys did your part.

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  26. So she wants people with arthritis in their fingers not to be able to defend themselves against the healthy criminals attacking them. Nice old lady…please retire and go away.

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  27. It’s really quite simple: We oppose the banning of anything that will have no effect on gun violence. If we “concede” a ban on bump stocks, even though such a ban will have absolutely no possible way to prevent someone determined to commit murder, what reason do we have to oppose the next ban? And the next ban after that? If we accept this ban which has no actual way to reduce crime, how can we oppose ANY ban that also has no actual way to reduce crime?

    Any concession to gun rights with no actual benefit to reduce crime is a direct attack on the Second Amendment.

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  28. What we need is counter snipers at large public events. Counter ambush the attack with concealed well trained riflemen and end conversation about the second amendment.

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  29. You’re going to lock me up for owning a piece of plastic? At tax payer expense? How sick is that?

    You’re going to lock me up for exercising my rights to life, liberty, and property as well as my right to bear arms? Also, if this guy wanted to own real full autos, he could have. He was eligible and could afford to buy them legally or illegally. He chose not to.

    Assuming what we’re being told is true.

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  30. If he is as rich as I’ve read, he could have bought all that stuff in a day or two. Not a problem.
    I negotiated an estate sale that had 57 guns in it. 2 hours, start to finish.

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  31. Now, if a group of riflemen had attended the concert, open- carrying their rifles, the good guys with their rifles would have stopped the bad guy with all of his rifles.

    If we continue to have terrorist attacks, by firearm, knife, or vehicle attack, we’ll need more riflemen out there. Isn’t Israel like that?

    I think I could have at least deterred or obstructed the shooter by returning fire with my M1 Garand. I think I can at least put rounds through a 4-foot square window reasonably accurately at 400 yards.

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  32. The Nation is a communist rag.
    People used to denounce communism for what it is and has done. Hopefully such clarity will return to our discourse.

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  33. LV-guy had bacon and eggs for breakfast at least half the time for the year before his massacre, including that morning.

    Ban the bacon!

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  34. 1) Bump fire stocks have never been used for a crime prior to this event, as far as we know.

    2) Bump fire stocks are TOYS for people who like to shoot firearms faster, exactly the same as collectors of fully automatic firearms.

    Banning an object used for a one-off crime is stupid. It deprives law-abiding people who use them legally of their entertainment.

    There is a little notion called “freedom” which everyone who proposes banning these devices fails to recognize. People have a right to do what they want provided THEY don’t hurt someone else. The fact that a criminal uses the same object as those people to do a criminal act does NOT justify depriving those other people of their freedom to use that object.

    Not to mention the obvious slippery slope which occurs when you start banning things people “don’t need.” That SAME argument has been used repeatedly by the anti-gun crowd to demonize semi-auto pistols and semi-auto rifles and magazine with greater than 10 rounds.

    People don’t NEED a car that goes faster than 55mph, but we don’t ban them even though it might save thousands of lives every year when people exceed the speed limit.

    People who who propose banning an object because people don’t “need” it are part of the problem. That includes the NRA who apparently is caving in in order to avoid further negative press. I get that people want to “make a deal” but there IS NO deal to be made. Ban one object on this basis and you’ll end up with no Second Amendment eventually.

    It’s that simple.

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  35. Pretty dumb claim when it comes to self defense trials. I’d imagine the prosecuting or civil attorney would have a field day with that description. I want a bullet with stopping power, not killing power.

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  36. What’s that? Bawk bawk bawk? All that time they took to read the situation and craft a position and thay’re still flip flopping. Gutless idiots.

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  37. Little Jerry has a very clear message. You are not good enough to be entrusted with the free exercise of your rights. Well armed, competent citizens are simply too scary to be tolerated. Only when we are all helpless and inept can we be truly equal.

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  38. A few years ago, one lone nut named Christopher Dorner shut down the entire state of California for over a week with an AR-15. Granted, Dorner’s indignation was misplaced, but imagine what a few million armed citizens with a righteous cause could do.

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