The package of eight gun safety measures the House Judiciary Committee advanced Thursday has a glaring omission, as Meteor Blades pointed out this week: it doesn’t ban assault weapons. It does raise the age limit for their purchase, but they could still be sold in obscene numbers.
That doesn’t mean Congress is ignoring the demand President Joe Biden made in his speech to the nation Thursday evening that the ban enacted in the ‘90s be renewed. Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced in a letter to Democrats that in addition to this package and other legislation, the House will have hearings on an assault weapons ban. A hearing is not a vote and it’s not a promise of a vote, but it’s something. The margins for passage are tiny, even in the House, but a couple of Republicans are even flirting with the idea of supporting one.
Then there’s the Senate, where the stranglehold Republicans have—with help from Democrats Joe Manchin (WV) and Kyrsten Sinema (AZ)—means an assault weapons ban is flat out not going to pass, not with the current 50/50 split.
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As of right now, Republicans are still pretending that they intend to do something. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) who McConnell tapped for the lead in this farce is playing it for all his worth. “It would feed the narrative that we can’t get things done in the public interest,” he told Politico. “I don’t believe that narrative, I believe we can get a bipartisan deal done in the public interest.”
That would be this John Cornyn:
If anything does pass, it will be incremental. “I’m not talking about restricting the rights of law-abiding citizens under the Second Amendment,” Cornyn said. “I’m talking about identifying people with criminal and mental health problems that are a threat to themselves and others.” So maybe some red flag laws will come of this. Because there won’t be 10 Republicans willing to do anything more. There are possibly not even 10 willing to say in writing, in law, that there are certain people who should not have access to weapons of war.
Elie Mystal is on Daily Kos' The Brief podcast
What a change from 1994. At The American Prospect, Harold Meyerson revisits an actual functioning Senate, when the assault weapons ban passed 56 to 43 as an amendment to the omnibus crime bill. It was not filibustered, because hardly anything was filibustered. Eight Republicans voted for it.
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“Today, that past, as the saying goes, is a foreign country,” writes Meyerson. “The following year, Newt Gingrich became Speaker of the House, and the Republican Party greatly accelerated its morphing into its current perpetual war status against Democrats and modernity.”
Democrats need to start writing the future, and fast. It seems that a healthy portion of the Democratic candidates for the Senate get that, and aren’t just running on gun safety, but on eliminating the filibuster.
“I will never let archaic Senate procedure stand in the way of our basic human rights, whether it’s the right to live free from gun violence, abortion access, or the right to vote,” Wisconsin Lt. Gov. Mandela Barnes said in an interview with The Washington Post this week. She’s running to be the Democratic nominee against Sen. Ron Johnson. “People are motivated, they want leaders that will do everything possible, and that means getting rid of the filibuster. … it has to go.” That sentiment is echoed by other Democratic candidates, including Milwaukee Bucks senior vice president Alex Lasry and state Treasurer Sarah Godlewski.
Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, vying for the open seat being vacated by Rob Portman is highlighting the fact that the House keeps doing its part, only to see the Senate squash their efforts. “[W]hile we mourn the 21 Americans murdered in another entirely preventable attack, I am beyond frustrated that the legislation we passed out of the House continues to stall in the Senate, held hostage by the filibuster and by politicians who refuse to do the right thing,” Ryan said in a statement. “It’s literally a matter of life and death and the Senate must act.”
Charles Booker, Kentucky Democrats’ nominee to unseat Rand Paul, is willing to run on gun regulation and ending the filibuster. “If you listen to the people of Kentucky, you’ll hear a resounding call for common-sense reform. We just don’t have leaders that pay us any attention,” Booker told the Post. “Any effort for progress is being used once again in the filibuster. And I’ve been a very strong proponent of getting rid of the filibuster so we can deliver results for the American people. And that includes gun safety and security and addressing this chaos.”
Pennsylvania Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, the nominee for that open seat, has been campaigning on both issues as part of his stump speech. “Keeping the filibuster in place means as a Democrat you believe there are 10 to 12 Republican senators of conscience who are going to say, ‘Oh, my God, we got it wrong our entire career … gun-control legislation? Yes, yes, where have I been all these years?’” Fetterman said in a speech before the primary. He is also running explicitly against Joe Manchin, making the case that the West Virginian needs to be made irrelevant.
This might be the time that is different, because it’s an election year and because it has become so blatantly clear that Republicans are actively working to hurt America, working to make sure more innocent lives are offered up as sacrifice.
“There used to be a profound sadness,” Angela Kuefler told the Post. She would know, she’s been the pollster for both Everytown for Gun Safety and Giffords. “Now that has been taken over by rage and anger, and anger is a motivating emotion.”
Kris Brown, president of Brady: United Against Gun Violence wants Biden to lead Democrats hard into this fight. Schumer needs to hold a floor vote on legislation, she said, and when it is filibustered Biden “needs to say right then and there that we need to end the filibuster.”
“I do think it’s a now-or-never moment. This is very much on people’s minds, they are devastated, and it’s not the America they want,” Brown said. “It’s on the lawmakers, but it’s also on the president. I would like him to say that this is a ‘top priority for this Senate,’ and I’d like him to say that ‘the filibuster is killing us.’”
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