Ripped From The (30 Year Old) Headlines

Controversial as Trump’s first 100 days have been, the Democrats are in a bind all their own.  With the party’s approval ratings at the lowest level since Appomattox, some of their leading lights are going back to their roots. 

In the case of Senators Chris Murphy (NJ) and Adam Schiff (CA), we’re talking Clinton-era roots; the California Senator is proposing a return to something similar to the Clinton/Dubya era “Assault Weapons Ban” (AWB):

The time to act is now.

I’m introducing the Assault Weapons Ban Act of 2025. pic.twitter.com/TZu7GTCjvF

— Adam Schiff (@SenAdamSchiff) April 30, 2025

“Today, I will be introducing the Assault weapons ban of 2025, a bill that would ban the sale, manufacture, import, and transfer of military style assault weapons,” Schiff said in a video posted on X. “Since 2006, there have been 486 mass shootings involving assault weapons. Hundreds and hundreds of Americans have been killed in these mass shootings.”

The lawmaker claimed the proposed legislation “is a way to attack that massive threat to our safety and security.”

    For 10 years, that bill had a dramatic impact on mass shootings and mass casualties. But when that expired, mass fatalities and gun shootings went up by 236%. The impact was that dramatic. It’s time to pass an assault weapons ban again. It’s time to protect our communities from senseless gun violence.

    It’s time to bring back that powerful common sense reform again. It’s time for the assault weapons ban of 2025.

There’s a two-inch grouping of holes right over the target in the argument, of course – let’s remember that the original AWB was allowed to sunset almost 20 years ago because, as even many of its committed supporters noted, it really didn’t do anything useful.   It didn’t even really ban “weapons”, per se – just scary accessories:

“Assault weapons” were never banned. Only inconsequential accessories like flash hiders, bayonet lugs and collapsible stocks were. You could buy the same exact rifle minus those accessories. The AWB 1994 was nothing more than a political stunt. pic.twitter.com/ap0Hk1xQFl

— 2ATexan (@2ndATexan) March 3, 2024

Beyond that, and much more importantly, the vast majority of shootings, even “mass shootings” (shootings with any motives involving three or more victims) involve the humble handgun, and criminals don’t ask permission and, for the most part, obtain their guns in violation of applicable existing laws. 

The National Rifle Association – which is scrambling to revitalize itself after the scandals of the Wayne LaPierre years – is sounding off on the issue:

https://t.co/Li11pRRbME pic.twitter.com/g0fuJ4GHsT

— NRA (@NRA) April 30, 2025

So – why would Schiff and Murphy introduce a bill that’s been not only rendered obsolete legaly (the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision bars bans of “commonly used firearms”, and given that there are 20 milion AR-15-pattern guns in the US alone, with likely a whole lot more getting sold with news of this “ban” attempt, they may be the most common single platform in the country) and socially (there’s a strong case to be made that gun rights have “gone viral” and won the social war), why bother to bring such an obvious loser of an issue back from the dead?

Original strategy there, Cotton. A failed policy — yes, the “assault weapons” ban was a failure that did nothing — is always the well you go to when your party is out of ideas. https://t.co/nPfH50TOCc

— Dana Loesch (@DLoesch) May 1, 2025

Given the sliding popularity of, and engagement with, the Democratic party, I’m going to go out on a short, sturdy limb and guess it has something to do with making voters like this…

A white liberal woman (surprise) spoke today at an assault weapon ban rally where she said

“I urge you to ask yourself, is a piece of paper that was written by slave holders more important than the kids?”

She was referring to the Constitution & the 2nd Amendment. pic.twitter.com/KoXyMrX7FZ

— Derrick Evans (@DerrickEvans4WV) April 30, 2025

…engage, and donate, more.