US Sen. Martin Heinrich held a roundtable in Washington on Wednesday to talk about his Gas-Operated Semi-Automatic Firearms Exclusion or GOSAFE Act he introduced last year.
The bill he introduced in November is designed to protect communities from gun violence by regulating firearms based on the lethality of their internal mechanisms, as opposed to focusing on cosmetic features that manufacturers can easily modify.
Heinrich says one of the things that Washington does not do well is nuance. You’re either for it or you’re against it, but the real world does not work that way.
“I’m a big believer, as someone who spent my entire life as a gun owner, that you can be a gun owner or a sportsman and simultaneously realize that we should not have ubiquitous access to weapons of war in our country. Because it’s not safe and because of the incredible toll that we are all paying as the result of the current lay of the land and the current lack of regulation of assault weapons.”
Among those at the roundtable was Doña Ana County Sheriff Kim Stewart who says for law enforcement, mass casualty events are probably their biggest concern especially when we’re talking about being able to reload numerous magazines within a very short period of time.
She says if you have a fixed magazine, that gives law enforcement much more opportunity to move in on a situation and take action before there are more casualties.
Others at the discussion included actress Melissa Joan Hart, who was a strong gun rights supporter until the school shootings at Sandy Hook and in Nashville, and actor Wilson Cruz who lost his aunt during the Pulse Nightclub shooting.
