The California Senate approved extending the one-gun-a-month handgun purchase limit to long guns on Tuesday, thereby limiting Californians to buying only one type of gun each 30-day period.
The bill is sponsored by Sen. Anthony Portantino (D-La Cañada Flintridge), who said, “There is no need or reason why a person would need to purchase more than one gun a month.”
According to the Los Angeles Times, Portantino indicated that limits on rifle and shotgun purchases will, in turn, limit straw purchasing. He is worried that some individual are passing background checks, then selling guns “on the underground market to criminals.”
Sen. Jim Nielsen (R-Chico) pointed to the failure of California gun control and asked why passing another law would make a difference. He said, “It’s more of the same that will not decrease violent crime.”
California has universal background checks, firearm registration requirements, gun confiscation laws, a ten-day waiting period on gun purchases, an “assault weapon” ban, a “good cause” requirement for concealed carry, and a myriad of other gun controls. Yet they also had the May 23, 2014, Santa Barbara firearm-based attack; the December 2, 2015, San Bernardino terror attack; the June 2016 UCLA murder/suicide; and the October 8, 2016, Palm Spring police officer ambush. So Nielsen’s point is that none of the gun laws have hindered criminals, and there is no reason to believe a new law will do so, either.
Sen. Jeff Stone (R-Murrieta) said Portantino’s gun purchase limit “is yet another example of the government’s trying to infringe on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens.”
AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
COMMENTS
Please let us know if you're having issues with commenting.