Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.) said in an interview Sunday that the Supreme Court appears poised to “fundamentally rewrite” the Second Amendment and raised concerns about the high court’s decision to strike down the Trump-era ban on bump stocks.
In an interview on CNN’s “State of the Union” with Jake Tapper, Murphy said he is concerned the high court will take action to limit Congress’s power to regulate guns.
Murphy’s biggest concern, he said, “is that this Supreme Court has signaled, in some of its gun decisions, that it is preparing to fundamentally rewrite the Second Amendment and permanently take away Congress’s ability to do simple things like require people pass a background check or move forward in taking dangerous weapons like AR-15s off the streets.”
“So I think this court is poised to make it very difficult for Congress or state legislatures to regulate guns and keep our communities and schools safe,” Murphy added.
The court struck down the ban Friday along ideological lines, ending a nationwide ban on bump stocks, which convert semiautomatic weapons into weapons capable of firing hundreds of rounds per minute.
The Biden administration defended the regulation before the high court after the Trump administration first implemented it in the wake of the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting, the deadliest in U.S. history. Authorities said the shooter used weapons equipped with butt stocks to kill 60 people and injure hundreds of others.
The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) classified the devices as machine guns under a long-standing federal law, making their possession a crime. The case before the Supreme Court did not implicate the Second Amendment.
In a 6-3 decision authored by conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, the court said the ATF stretched the law too far, ruling in favor of the challenger. Justice Samuel Alito joined Thomas’s opinion, but wrote separately that a “simple solution” would be for Congress to change the law to allow for a bump stock ban.
“This is a Republican administration that banned bump stocks. At the time, Republicans in the Senate and House supported it,” Murphy said in the Sunday interview.
“But now that they have a Supreme Court that appears ready to nullify the entire Second Amendment and strip Congress or the executive branch of the ability to keep our communities safe, they are once again lining up behind the gun industry. ”
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (DN.Y.) said Sunday he is planning to hold a vote on legislation to ban gun stocks this week.
This story originally appeared on thehill.com read the full story
