John–
What do all of these tragedies have in common?
All of them were carried out with an assault weapon.
These weapons have been used to commit many of the deadliest mass shootings in the United States, including most recently in Lewiston, Maine, where a shooter killed 18 people and wounded 13 more at a restaurant and bowling alley.
We've been hard at work pushing Congress to ban assault weapons—and we're making progress.
Senator Heinrich recently introduced the Gas-Operated Semi-Automatic Firearms Exclusion (GOSAFE) Act, which would regulate these dangerous firearms based on their gas operating systems.
The GOSAFE Act gets at the core of our country's mass shooting problem: semi-automatic firearms that allow shooters to fire dozens of shots in seconds and then quickly reload using large-capacity magazines.
Everything that we know about mass shootings suggests that assault weapons, especially when equipped with high-capacity magazines, make them more deadly. And we're seeing more of these weapons because there are more of them—and they're easier than ever to get. For decades, gun manufacturers have reaped billions of dollars in profits from assault weapon sales—profits that grow at the expense of lives and public safety.
But the gun lobby doesn't even call these guns "assault weapons"—they pretend not to know what an assault weapon is and say it's a "made up" term. But the American people know exactly what these weapons are, and have seen the terror and trauma they've inflicted time and time again.
The gun industry plays clueless because they're interested in protecting one thing: their bottom line. And the decisions that the gun industry makes in corporate boardrooms have a direct impact on what's happening in our communities.
61% of Americans support banning assault weapons because we know it will save lives. It's time Congress followed suit. Send a message urging your representative and senators to ban assault weapons now!
We're one step closer to getting these deadly weapons out of our communities. Together, we can make sure our lawmakers know we're counting on them to keep us safe.
Thank you for taking action,
Monisha Henley
She/Her/Hers
Senior Vice President, Government Affairs
Everytown for Gun Safety
