ACTION ALERT – Tell the Government to Ban Bump Stocks
After the horrific shooting in Las Vegas, Congress did exactly what we’ve come to expect from them: nothing. The shooter used a legal, unregulated accessory called a bump stock to make his semi-automatic rifle shoot like a machine gun, letting him fire more bullets in less time. Learning about this deadly device led to outrage and calls to ban this accessory–even from Congressional Republicans –but still, Congress did nothing. Instead, they kicked the can to a government bureau to deal with bump stocks. Now, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) is deciding if these dangerous devices that make firearms imitate machine guns should be banned.
Before the ATF makes their decision, they want to hear what the American public thinks. Now is your chance to make your voice heard: submit a public comment to the federal register and tell the ATF to ban bump stocks. The comment period ends on January 25th at 11:59 pm EST, so you need to act now. Lives depend on it.
- Click here to visit the Federal Register website.
- Write your comment. To make this quick and easy we drafted a sample public comment for you – see below.
- Hit Submit. Be sure to press the green “submit comment” button — and you’re done!
SAMPLE PUBLIC COMMENT: Feel free to directly copy and paste this sample comment into the form on the Federal Register page.
On the night of October 1st, 2017, a gunman opened fire from a hotel room on the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel into the 22,000 person crowd at the Route 91 Harvest country music festival in Las Vegas, Nevada, killing 58 people and injuring more than 500. The gunman fired more than 1,100 rounds of ammunition in 11 minutes, using semi-automatic rifles modified with a dangerous firearm accessory designed to dramatically accelerate the rate of gunfire, commonly known as “bump fire stocks.” These devices are intended to circumvent the restrictions on possession of fully automatic firearms in the Gun Control Act of 1968 and the National Firearms Act of 1934 by allowing an individual to modify a semiautomatic rifle in such a manner that it operates with a similar rate of fire as a fully automatic rifle. While often marketed as a novelty item for recreational shooters, bump stocks and similar devices that accelerate the rate of fire of a semiautomatic firearm are extremely dangerous and pose a substantial risk to public safety.
To fully protect American communities from another mass shooting on the devastating scale of Las Vegas, Congress must act to ban bump stocks and other similar firearm devices or accessories. In the absence of action by Congress, ATF should issue a new rule clarifying that the definition of “machinegun” in the National Firearms Act of 1934 includes conversion devices like bump fire stocks that convert a semi-automatic rifle into the functional equivalent of a fully automatic rifle. In creating this rule, ATF must take into account the toll of gun violence on communities like Las Vegas, in terms of injuries, loss of life, and the financial loss to businesses in the communities that are affected. The continued presence of these dangerous devices poses a continuing threat to all of our communities and both Congress and ATF must take action quickly to address this threat to public safety.