AN ACT ADDRESSING GUN VIOLENCE.
Based on Gov. Ned Lamont’s gun control package:
—Prevent those under 21 from buying any gun
—Require registration of previously grandfathered assault weapons
—Increase safe storage requirements in the home
—Hike penalties regarding large-capacity magazines
—Mandate the registration of all ghost guns, handmade weapons that can be constructed with parts and instructions that are available over the internet or with 3D printers
—Ban the “open carry” of a gun
—Prevent anyone from buying more than one handgun per month
Wednesday, April 19 is ProWo CAGV Day!
We will be working with Connecticut Against Gun Violence to talk to legislators face-to-face to ask for their support, hand them CAGV's fact sheet and make a visual #wearorange statement about the strength of our movement.
Please sign up for this: prowo462@gmail.com
Republican response to HB 6667
Rep. Craig Fishbein, the committee’s ranking House Republican, said that no one from Lamont’s administration or the state police testified in front of the committee to explain and defend the controversial bill. “Sandy Hook was a tragedy — something these many years past I think about all too often,” Fishbein said, adding that 30 different laws were broken by Adam Lanza, the shooter at the elementary school.
Rep. Doug Dubitsky, a Republican attorney from Chaplin in eastern Connecticut, said that the nearby states of Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont have “constitutional carry,” which means that citizens do not need a gun permit. Connecticut’s extensive gun restrictions do not “make us any safer than Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont,” Dubitsky said, adding that it is a “birthright” to carry a gun. ”Connecticut is going backwards.”
Dubitsky added, “This bill is tyranny. This bill is directed at disarming the law-abiding people of this state. You would think the people would have learned from history about what disarming the people can bring. … It happened in the Ottoman Empire. … The Soviet Union. … The same thing happened in Nazi Germany, in China. … It all started the same way, and it all ended the same way.”
Dubitsky rejected Lamont’s proposal for buying one gun per month, saying that the government would never tell citizens that they could buy only one book or newspaper per month.
Sen. Rob Sampson, among the most conservative Republicans in the legislature, said “there is no data” that eliminating the requirement for a pistol permit “has a negative impact on crime.”
Sampson added, “It seems like any time there’s a tragedy, the go-to answer is more gun control. There are violent murders in our state on a regular basis, and they are rarely discussed in this committee. … We certainly mourn for the people who were killed in that terrible tragedy” in Tennessee. “We don’t need politics. We need reasonable policy debates. … I wonder if people are aware of the FBI statistics that more people are murdered by bare hands than by long guns.”
But Democrats sharply rejected a Republican amendment for constitutional carry by 23-12, noting that Connecticut is considered among the safest states nationally.
Stafstrom said that another unsuccessful Republican amendment would have made it possible for a person in a bathing suit to strap a gun around their waist and walk along the crowded beach on the July 4 holiday at Hammonasset Beach State Park in Madison.
Concerning the provision to limit the sale of handguns to one per month, Stafstrom said it is designed “to cut down on straw purchasing” that often involves re-selling guns to criminals and those without permits.
He added that a 10-day waiting period for gun purchases would be beneficial because “waiting periods are shown to reduce the suicide risk.”
But Rep. Greg Howard, a Republican who has served as a Stonington police officer for the past 21 years, said that the bill would not prevent mass shootings because no law passed by the legislature “is ever going to legislate evil out of the hearts of people.”
Source: https://www.courant.com/2023/03/28/major-gun-control-bill-passes-key-connecticut-committee/