Trump: Bump Stocks Are All Obama’s Fault

Sen. Dianne Feinstein in 2017, introducing legislation to ban the sale and possession of bump-stocks. Her bill went nowhere, of course, thanks to NRA opposition and Republican cowardice.Bill Clark/Congressional Quarterly/Newscom via ZUMA

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Donald Trump this morning:

This is actually sort of true, more or less. That’s unusual for Donald Trump. But the reason it’s true is that Obama didn’t interfere when the ATF concluded in 2010 that the law gave them no authority to regulate bump stocks. The Kenyan socialist gun-hating dictator-in-chief then followed the law! Hard to imagine, isn’t it?

Needless to say, Sen. Dianne Feinstein and others have introduced legislation over the years to ban bump stocks as part of a very modest assault weapons ban, but these bills never saw the light of day thanks to NRA and Republican opposition. Last year, Feinstein introduced a bill limited just to banning bump stocks, but it also died thanks to NRA opposition and Republican timidity. Big surprise, eh? So now Trump is going to try to do it via executive order.

Will this work in the face of previous rulings that bump stocks are legal under current law? Will the NRA sue to overturn the EO? If they do, who will the courts side with? We could know the answers to all these questions next week if Republicans simply passed a bill to ban bump stocks. The original ATF ruling was based on statutory interpretation, not constitutional law, so a new law would clean up any confusion instantly. But Republicans are afraid to take even this tiny step for fear of crossing the NRA, so instead we probably won’t know for years.

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“Lying.” “Disgusting.” “Scum.” “Slime.” “Corrupt.” “Enemy of the people.” Donald Trump has always made clear what he thinks of journalists. And it’s plain now that his administration intends to do everything it can to stop journalists from reporting things they don’t like—which is most things that are true.

No one gets to tell Mother Jones what to publish or not publish, because no one owns our fiercely independent newsroom. But that also means we need to directly raise the resources it takes to keep our journalism alive. There’s only one way for that to happen, and it’s readers like you stepping up. Please help with a donation today if you can—even a few bucks will make a real difference. A monthly gift would be incredible.

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