Governor Jerry Brown signed a package of six bills Friday that expand background checks for ammunition purchases; ban the sale of semiautomatic rifles with “bullet buttons” that allow for easy replacement of magazines; and restrict the loaning of guns without background checks to friends and family.
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California already has some of the toughest gun control laws in the nation, but after the shooting spree in the Southern California city of San Bernardino last December, lawmakers began work on measures they said would close unintended loopholes.
“Many want to blame those horrors and those terrorist attacks on law-abiding citizens”, said Assemblywoman Shannon Grove, R-Bakersfield, speaking about the mass shootings in Orlando and San Bernardino.
“My goal in signing these bills is to enhance public safety by tightening our existing laws in a responsible and focused manner, while protecting the rights of law-abiding gun owners”, Brown who owns guns, said in his signing message. Those bills included measures that would allow no more than one gun purchase every 30 days and would create a way for people, such as coworkers or school officials, to request that a court temporarily take away a person’s gun rights if they believe the person is risky.
While he vetoed five bills – including a one-gun-per-month purchase limit – he endorsed the most ambitious pieces of the Legislature’s gun control push over the roar of gun-rights advocates frustrated by the increasing weight of restrictions.
Democrats in the legislature rushed the measures through in hopes of passing them before their summer break, in part to try to forestall a competing gun control proposal headed for the November ballot.
Democrats who control the legislature in California had voted in favour of the bills while most Republicans had voted against.
The legislative advocate for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, Amanda Wilcox, hailed the governor’s action, highlighting one bill sponsored by Sen. “It can give us a handle on who has illegal guns in the state, as well as limiting access to ammunition by risky people who may have illegal guns”.
Additionally, a new set of ammunition regulations establishes background checks for purchasers, required licenses to sell ammunition and a system for collecting sale information.
Authorities in California are using a new law created to prevent the next mass shooting by temporarily confiscating guns from people considered a danger to themselves or others.
For the third time since 2012, he vetoed a bill requiring gun owners to report a lost or stolen firearm to authorities within five days.
Brown vetoed another bill that would make it a misdemeanor not to report the loss or theft of a gun, saying he doesn’t believe the measure would help stop gun traffickers.
The enactment of the legislation leaves little doubt to the standing of California, which in 1989 became the first state to ban assault weapons, as a leader in gun control at a moment when Congress has rebuffed such efforts and numerous Republican-led states are moving in the other direction.
Can gun seizures prevent next mass shooting? “We know they were designed by the military to kill as many people as possible in as short of a time as possible”.
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That initiative is being championed by Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom, a Democrat who is running for governor after Brown’s final term ends in 2018. The governor is expected to act on several gun control measures approved by lawmakers in the next few days.
