During his State of the Union address last night, President Biden used his platform to renew a call for a ban on so-called “assault weapons”. The definition of “assault weapons” used by anti-gun advocates is vague, broad, and in some senses utterly meaningless, but it may now include a new class of firearms: semi-automatic pistols.
Both Heller and Bruen (landmark Supreme Court decisions surrounding the Second Amendment) have upheld the prohibition of a ban on firearms in “common use” for the purposes of self-defense. Estimates vary widely, but according to Mark Oliva, the Managing Director of Public Affairs at the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), from 1990 to 2020 approximately 100 million semi-automatic pistols have been sold in America. Americans purchased an additional 18.8 million firearms in 2021, alone, illustrating an increasing trend towards, not against, gun ownership.
During last night’s State of the Union address, President Biden made a series of statements that seem to hint at the next move in the Left’s anti-gun playbook. Present at the State of the Union address was Brandon Tsay, the hero who stopped a demented criminal on a rampage that had already killed 11 people in Monterey Park, California, when he shot the assailant with his own gun.
The President properly acknowledged and honored Mr. Tsay’s life-saving actions. Then he quickly shifted from talking about the actions on that day to the objects used on that day.
Joining us tonight is Brandon Tsay, a 26-year-old hero.
Brandon put off his college dreams to stay by his mom’s side as she was dying from cancer. He now works at a dance studio started by his grandparents.
Two weeks ago, during Lunar New Year celebrations, he heard the studio’s front door close and saw a man pointing a gun at him.
He thought he was going to die, but then he thought about the people inside.
In that instant, he found the courage to act and wrestled the semi-automatic pistol away from a gunman who had already killed 11 people at another dance studio.
He saved lives. It’s time we do the same as well.
Ban assault weapons once and for all.
Numerous news outlets and observers have made the connection in the last 24 hours that Mr. Biden calling for a ban on “assault weapons” directly after mentioning the “semi-automatic” pistol used in the shooting was no accident.
It seems that the intent is to reclassify these lawfully owned and manufactured firearms in the mind of the public eye by simply renaming them. And once the public is comfortable with handguns in ubiquitous use being called “assault weapons”, it’s only a matter of time until they will be subject to the same ban being levied at other classifications of firearms.
