The elected Democrat Jerry Nadler announced this Friday that the American House of Representatives would vote on a ban on assault rifles, weapons used in the recent killings that mourned the United States, for the first time in twenty years.
“It is extremely frightening and worrying that a weapon which was designed as an instrument of war finds itself in the hands of 18-year-olds,” lamented the one who chairs the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives, in reference to the age of the Uvalde shooter, who killed 19 children and two teachers at a Texas elementary school on May 24.
An impossible ban?
Thus, the Judiciary Committee of the House of Representatives will vote on Wednesday on the prohibition of this type of weapon. If the measure is adopted by this committee, it will then be submitted to a vote of all the elected members of the House, controlled by the Democrats. “Our caucus broadly supports a ban on assault rifles,” House Democratic Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday.
Despite this strong support, and barring a huge surprise, the law would fail to pass the Senate stage, where the support of ten Republicans, very protective of the right of Americans to bear arms, would be necessary because of qualified majority rules. After the Uvalde massacre, President Joe Biden had pleaded for a ban on assault rifles, or at least to raise the legal age to 21 to obtain them.
Rifles banned for ten years
Gathered at the foot of the US Congress on Wednesday, parents of young victims of this tragedy had again implored elected officials to ban the sale of assault rifles. In 1994, Congress passed a law banning assault rifles and certain high-capacity magazines for ten years. However, it expired in 2004 and sales have since soared, especially among young people.
