During the confirmation hearing for Supreme Court justice nominee Neil Gorsuch, California Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein used some of her time to speak by ridiculing the nation’s oldest civil rights group: the National Rifle Association. Sen. Feinstein referred to the NRA as an “extreme organization,” in between talking about other issues like air and water pollution.
“It is the Supreme Court that will have final word … [on] whether the NRA and other extreme organizations will be able to block common sense gun regulations, including those that keep military-style assault weapons off our streets,” Feinstein said.
Feinstein’s bashing on the NRA was upside down at best since it misleads her continued support of an “assault weapons” ban. Feinstein uses the term “military-style assault weapons” in a deliberate effort to complicate how the public views them.
Semi-automatic weapons, which are only guns that fire one shot per trigger pull, have been commonly used in the United States for more than a century. Early production began in the late 1800s, and it has been one of the most popular guns for decades. In fact, it is still the most popular rifle to date. Feinstein’s use of the term assault weapons suggests that selective-fire military firearms are easily sold to the general public, which is not the case.
The National Firearms Act has restricted the sales and possession of certain assault rifles, submachine guns, and machine guns since 1934. About 240,000 registered guns, of these nature, belong to civilians in the U.S., but there are only two incidents, on record, of them being used in a crime. Also, the manufacturing of new NFA firearms for the general public was outlawed 31 years ago, when the Hughes Amendment passed as part of the Firearm Owners Protection Act in 1986.
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