Rhode Island legislators adopt the bill to prohibit the sales of assault weapons

Providence, RI – Friday, the State House controlled by Democrat of Rhode Island approved on Friday a legislation which would prohibit the sale and manufacture of many Semi-automatic rifles commonly called assault weapons.

The proposal is now going to the office of the Democratic Governor Dan McKee, who declared in an article on the social platform X on Friday evening that he planned to sign the bill. If this happens, the Rhode Island will join 10 states which have a kind of powerful firearm ban which have once been prohibited on a national level and are now largely the weapon of choice among those responsible for most devastating mass fire in the country.

Defenders of firearms have been pressure for a ban on assault weapons in Rhode Island for more than a decade. However, although it is a democratic bastion, the legislators of the smallest state in the country have long stood out on the need and the legality of these proposals.

The bill only applies to the sale and manufacture of assault weapons and not to possession. Only Washington’s state has a Similar law. Residents who seek to buy an assault weapon in New Hampshire nearby or elsewhere will also be blocked. Federal law prohibits people from traveling to another state to buy a firearm and return it to a state where this particular weapon is prohibited.

Nine states and the Columbia district have prohibitions in possession of assault weapons, covering big cities like New York and Los Angeles. Hawaii prohibits assault pistols.

Democratic representative Rebecca Kislak described the bill during the floor debates on Friday as a progressive decision which feeds Rhode Island in accordance with neighboring states.

“I am seriously disappointed, we will do more, and we should do more,” she said. “And I had the opportunity to do this or nothing, I vote to do something.”

Critics of the law proposed by the Rhode Island argued that the prohibitions of assault weapons do not do much to limit mass fire and punish only people with such rifles.

“This bill does not take care of criminals, it only rejects the burden of law respectful of law,” said Republican senator Thomas Paolino.

The republican representative Michael Chippendale, head of the House minority, predicted that if the legislation should become law, the United States Supreme Court considered it ultimately unconstitutional.

“We throw money on this,” he said.

It is not only the Republicans who opposed the legislation. David Hogg – A Defender of firearms control who survived the 2018 school shooting In Parkland, Florida – and the Coalition of Rhode Island against armed violence described the proposed ban as “the ban on the weakest assault in the country”.

“I know that the Rhode Islanders deserves a strong bill which not only prohibited sale, but also the possession of assault weapons. It is this combination that is equivalent to public security,” said Hogg in a statement.

Elisabeth Ryan, Everytown political lawyer for firearms security, rejected allegations that the proposed law is low.

“The weakest law is what Rhode Island has now, no ban on assault weapons,” said Ryan. “This would create a real and enforceable ban on the sale and manufacture of assault weapons, as is the law already working in the state of Washington, by bringing them out of the shelves of the Rhode Island fire -to -fire stores once and for all.”

At the national level, prohibitions of assault weapons have been disputed before the courts by groups of firearms which argue that the prohibitions violated the second amendment. AR-15 style firearms are among the country’s best-selling rifles.

The Supreme Court of the Conservative Major could soon approach the issue. The judges refused to hear a challenge for the ban on assault weapons in Maryland in early June, but three conservative judges – Samuel Alito, Neil Gorsuch and Clarence Thomas – publicly noted their disagreement. A fourth, Brett Kavanaugh, said it was skeptical that the prohibitions were constitutional and predicted that the Court would hear a case “in the next term or two”.