John—

Yesterday, I testified on behalf of GIFFORDS Law Center in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee about the dangers of bump stocks, auto sears, and other conversion devices designed to turn semiautomatic firearms into machine guns.

Both bump stocks and auto sears are extremely dangerous conversion devices that, when added to guns, increase their rate of fire to that of a fully automatic weapon.

Bump stocks do this by harnessing a weapon’s recoil or kickback to activate the trigger many times faster than a human could—and there’s no longer a federal ban on them. Auto sears, also known as “Glock switches,” are small, illegal devices the size of a Lego that attach to the end of a gun and allow it to fire continually with a single pull of the trigger—and they’re incredibly easy to make at home or traffic into the country.

These devices have been used in mass shootings, including the Route 91 Harvest music festival shooting in Las Vegas, the deadliest shooting in modern American history.

Watch a video of the hearing to learn more about the dangers of bump stocks and auto sears.

On the panel yesterday—which convened just a few months after the Supreme Court reversed the federal ban on bump stocks in Garland v. Cargill—I received questions from senators about the legal pathways to regulate these devices.

I made it very clear: We can and must push Congress and state legislatures to take action to categorize bump stocks as the serious threats to public safety they are. GIFFORDS Law Center is working hard to make sure these devices stay out of civilian hands, and a number of states have already banned them—but we need more to follow their lead.

The gun industry continues to build and market accessories whose only purpose is to make shootings even deadlier, but we’re never going to stop fighting back. Thank you for making this work possible, and for your commitment to ending America’s gun violence epidemic.

Warm regards,
Esther

—
Esther Sanchez-Gomez
Litigation Director
GIFFORDS Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence

For over 30 years, the legal experts at Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence have been fighting for a safer America. Led by former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, Giffords Law Center researches, drafts, and defends the laws, policies, and programs proven to save lives from gun violence.

This email was sent to [email protected].

Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence
268 Bush St. #555
San Francisco, CA 94104

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