PolitiFact: Joe Biden Not Banning Guns, Just ‘Assault Weapons’

PolitiFact contends that Democrat presidential hopeful Joe Biden is not seeking to ban guns, just “assault weapons.”

PolitiFact made these claims in reaction to a National Rifle Association (NRA) Facebook post, which said:

PolitiFact suggests that Biden’s ban would be a replication of the 1994 “assault weapons” ban, which “focused on 18 specific firearms and banned certain models of AR-15s and AK-47s.” Moreover, those who already owned the banned guns were allowed to keep them, so PolitiFact argues that it was not a ban on guns at all.

The website asserts:

[When Biden says he’d] champion a ban on assault weapons and high-capacity magazines like the bans he supported in 1994. Those bans prevented the manufacture and sale of certain weapons for private citizens to use; they did not confiscate or prevent the sale of weapons that were purchased before the restrictions went into effect.

In light of these things, PolitiFact said the NRA’s claim that Biden wants to ban guns is “mostly false.”

But PolitiFact has missed two important points: First, this is 2019, not 1994, and the Democrats’ current “assault weapons” legislation bans hundreds of firearms rather than 18. On July 11, 2019, Breitbart News reported that Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) “assault weapons” ban covered 205 different firearms.

Secondly, Biden explicitly stated his desire to mandate that owners of banned guns hand them over and receive government compensation. He made this statement to show agreement with then-presidential hopeful Eric Swalwell’s forced background scheme.

On June 27, 2019, Biden pushed a government buyback of “assault weapons” and limits on the “number of clips in a gun.”

The bottom line—Biden is pushing a gun ban.

In light of this, the NRA Institute for Legislative Action responded to PolitiFact by rating its article “politics, not fact.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.