Add Bump Stocks to the List of Gun Stuff Florida’s Legislative Leaders Don’t Want to Discuss

As I mentioned earlier today, it certainly looks like this year’s legislative session in Florida won’t include action to repeal the ban on gun sales to adults under the age of 21 or the state’s prohibition on open carry, despite the urging of Gov. Ron DeSantis to address these issues. 

Those aren’t the only 2A topics that have left the Republican leadership gun-shy, however. As Florida Politics reports, multiple bills dealing with the state’s ban on bump stocks have gone absolutely nowhere this session. 

Legislation on bump stocks, devices that use the recoil of a semi-automatic rifle so that it fires at near-automatic speed, hasn’t gotten any consideration at the Capitol this year.

That includes a pair of bills (SB 1234, HB 6013) to repeal Florida’s ban on them and another legislative couplet to hike penalties for their use (SB 254, HB 1621).

With most committee action winding down, bills that haven’t been heard in committee yet are likely dead.

Florida’s bump stock ban went into effect March 9, 2018, less than a month after the deadliest school shooting in the state’s history. It was part of a sweeping gun safety package called the “Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Act,” which also added a three-day waiting period for gun purchases and hiked the age limit to buy long rifles to 21.

President Donald Trump’s first administration imposed a national ban on bump stocks nine months later. The move, while close to the Marjory Stoneman Douglas shooting, was more in response to the October 2017 massacre in Las Vegas, where a shooter used the device. The high school shooter did not. 

But on June 14, 2023, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the Trump administration did not follow federal law in implementing the ban and that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) had overstepped its authority.

That ruling inspired Palm City Republican Rep. Toby Overdorf to file HB 6013, his first bill of the 2025 Session. He told Florida Politics in February that the state’s law should comport with federal law.

“I would like for state law to comply with federal law,” he said, adding, “I’m a strong supporter of the Second Amendment. This is an infringement upon the Second Amendment.”

I’m on board with scrapping the state’s ban on bump stocks, but it’s worth noting that the Supreme Court’s decision in Cargill wasn’t based on the right to keep and bear arms. In fact, the Second Amendment never factored into the Court’s decision. Instead, the justices determined that the ATF overstepped its administrative authority in treating non-mechanical bump stocks like machine guns. 

The hands-off approach cuts both ways, however. While the GOP majority hasn’t taken any steps to get rid of the ban, it hasn’t moved on any Democrat-sponsored bills that would broaden the ban either. 

Boca Raton Democratic Sen. Tina Scott Polsky, who sponsored SB 254, said she’s been dismayed seeing her GOP colleagues in the Legislature repeatedly try to roll back gun safety laws.

“I don’t understand this backwards trend we’re seeing,” she said. “As the Senator of Parkland, I want to do everything I can to keep that good work going and go further to keep Floridians safe.”

If passed, SB 254 or HB 1621 would expand the definition of “machine gun” in Florida Statutes to include any firearm modified to fire at a rate that mimics an automatic weapon.

Possession of a machine gun in Florida is a second-degree felony, punishable by up to 15 years in prison for a first offense and $10,000 in fines.

It’s great that Polsky’s bill has gone nowhere, but that’s honestly to be expected given the Republican supermajority in Tallahassee, and it doesn’t take away the sting of the unwillingness of politicians like Senate President Ben Albritton to bring bills like the repeal of the state’s ban on gun sales to young adults to the Senate floor. I expect a “Do no harm” approach from lawmakers in ostensibly Second Amendment-friendly states, but a “Provide no help” stance is a bad look for those who claim to support our right to keep and bear arms.