WASHINGTON, Jan 14: Gun rights groups yesterday forecast that bids to ban assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition clips would fail in Congress, as Vice President Joe Biden prepares this week to give President Barack Obama proposals to curb gun violence.
Even some congressional Democrats indicated that a bill to revive the US assault weapons ban that expired in 2004 would have a difficult time winning passage in the Republican-controlled House of Representatives and Democratic-led Senate.
“An assault weapons stand-alone ban – on just guns alone … In the political reality that we have today, will not go anywhere,” Democratic Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, himself a gun owner, told the CNN program “State of the Union.”
National Rifle Association President David Keene signaled little appetite for compromise as the White House considers action on gun violence after the December 14 massacre of 20 children and six adults at a Connecticut elementary school.
“What we put the brakes on is anything that simply takes away a person’s Second Amendment right for no good reason,” Keene told the CNN show, referring to the US Constitution’s guarantee of the right to bear arms.
“The likelihood is that they are not going to be able to get an assault weapons ban through this Congress,” Keene said. Asked about new limits on high-capacity ammunition clips, he added: “I don’t think ultimately they are going to get that either.”
Biden, who heads a task force on gun violence due to give Obama recommendations as early as tomorrow, has said he will recommend universal background checks for gun buyers and new limits on the capacity of magazines like those used by the Connecticut gunman.
Biden and three members of Obama’s Cabinet are to meet with members of the Republican-controlled U.S. House of Representatives on Monday as he prepared recommendations on how to curb gun violence in the United States.
The White House also has said it will try to revive the US ban on assault weapons that expired in 2004 after being in effect for a decade. Democratic Senators Dianne Feinstein of California and Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut are expected to introduce legislation on reviving the assault-weapons ban.
(AGENCIES)
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