(09/09/04)
Police chiefs plead for renewal of assault weapons ban
By Andrew Mollison
andym@coxnews.com
Cox News Service
WASHINGTON -- Dozens of police chiefs said Wednesday that their officers would be safer if President Bush and congressional leaders extend a 10-year-old ban on making or importing military-style assault weapons, which is due to expire Monday.
"Tragically, this year alone there have been more than a dozen officers killed with assault weapons," said Joseph Polisar, chief of the Garden City, Calif., police department and president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police.
The chiefs represented several law enforcement associations and were accompanied by colleagues and relatives of officers slain by assault weapons.
But Polisar said they were stonewalled by the White House, which ignored their request for a meeting. Their request for an immediate vote was rejected by Republican congressional leaders, who schedule all votes in Congress. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., ruled out a floor vote, and John Feehery, press secretary to Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said a vote on extending the ban "is not on our radar screen" in the House.
Feehery also denied Polisar's assertion that Hastert or his staff agreed to meet with the chiefs.
"The chiefs are certainly entitled to their opinion," said Chris Cox, chief lobbyist for the ban's leading public opponent, the National Rifle Association. "But there's not one legitimate law enforcement study that has shown this ban had any effect on reducing crime."
However, the chiefs said their officers and citizens would be safer if gang members, drug dealers and bank robbers didn't have easy access to a new generation of cheap, semi-automatic assault weapons capable of firing 30 bullets in five seconds. The expiring law forbids making or importing 19 types of military-style weapons, including AK-47s, TEC-9s and UZIs, as well as magazines that hold up to 100 rounds of ammunition, instead of the current limit of 10.
Officers killed this year by criminals using high-capacity magazines in similar weapons -- manufactured before the ban or designed after the ban to resemble the banned weapons -- include three slain in Birmingham, Ala., in June.
"My three friends were killed so fast that (some) of us never even got our guns out of our holsters," said officer Michael Collins of Birmingham. "I believe people have a right for weapons to hunt or defend themselves, but these things are military weapons, pure and simple."
Polisar said, "Unless Congress acts, once again our officers will be outgunned."
Atlanta chief Richard Pennington said that Congress wouldn't act unless Bush asked it to schedule a vote. "We hope President Bush does the right thing, because we're sick and tired of seeing our young people killed," Pennington said.
But Bush spokesman Scott McClellan told the White House press corps that while Bush has favored keeping the ban since his 2000 campaign, "the president doesn't set the congressional timetable."
In March, Bush opposed an attempt in the Senate to add an extension of the ban to a bill designed to limit liability lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers.
Bush's Democratic challenger, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, was among the senators who nevertheless voted to add the ban to the bill, which was then killed after the National Rifle Association said the amendment was unacceptable.
Polls regularly indicate that more than two-thirds of the public, and even one-third of NRA members, favor the ban. But NRA lobbyist Cox said that wouldn't influence Congress, because the ban was just as popular with the general public in 1994, when Democrats lost control of the House after adopting the anti-crime law that included the ban.
Then-President Bill Clinton estimated that campaigns by the NRA and other gun groups against the ban's supporters cost the Democrats at least 20 House seats that year.
"The ban is not only bad policy, it's bad politics," Cox said. "Once they get educated on an issue, our members and other gun owners are very intense."
In fact, the House is expected to vote within a few weeks on a bill sponsored by Rep. Mark Souder, R-Ind., that would let members showcase their opposition to other gun control laws. His press secretary, Martin Green, said Souder received a commitment from the leadership for a floor vote sometime this year on his bill, which would repeal a local law in the District of Columbia that requires private owners to register their handguns and store them safely and unloaded.
International Association of Chiefs of Police: www.theiacp.org
National Rifle Association: www.nra.org
Andrew Mollison is a Washington correspondent for Cox Newspapers.
Police chiefs plead for renewal of assault weapons ban
By Andrew Mollison
andym@coxnews.com
Cox News Service
WASHINGTON -- Dozens of police chiefs said Wednesday that their officers would be safer if President Bush and congressional leaders extend a 10-year-old ban on making or importing military-style assault weapons, which is due to expire Monday.
"Tragically, this year alone there have been more than a dozen officers killed with assault weapons," said Joseph Polisar, chief of the Garden City, Calif., police department and president of the International Association of Chiefs of Police.
The chiefs represented several law enforcement associations and were accompanied by colleagues and relatives of officers slain by assault weapons.
But Polisar said they were stonewalled by the White House, which ignored their request for a meeting. Their request for an immediate vote was rejected by Republican congressional leaders, who schedule all votes in Congress. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., ruled out a floor vote, and John Feehery, press secretary to Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., said a vote on extending the ban "is not on our radar screen" in the House.
Feehery also denied Polisar's assertion that Hastert or his staff agreed to meet with the chiefs.
"The chiefs are certainly entitled to their opinion," said Chris Cox, chief lobbyist for the ban's leading public opponent, the National Rifle Association. "But there's not one legitimate law enforcement study that has shown this ban had any effect on reducing crime."
However, the chiefs said their officers and citizens would be safer if gang members, drug dealers and bank robbers didn't have easy access to a new generation of cheap, semi-automatic assault weapons capable of firing 30 bullets in five seconds. The expiring law forbids making or importing 19 types of military-style weapons, including AK-47s, TEC-9s and UZIs, as well as magazines that hold up to 100 rounds of ammunition, instead of the current limit of 10.
Officers killed this year by criminals using high-capacity magazines in similar weapons -- manufactured before the ban or designed after the ban to resemble the banned weapons -- include three slain in Birmingham, Ala., in June.
"My three friends were killed so fast that (some) of us never even got our guns out of our holsters," said officer Michael Collins of Birmingham. "I believe people have a right for weapons to hunt or defend themselves, but these things are military weapons, pure and simple."
Polisar said, "Unless Congress acts, once again our officers will be outgunned."
Atlanta chief Richard Pennington said that Congress wouldn't act unless Bush asked it to schedule a vote. "We hope President Bush does the right thing, because we're sick and tired of seeing our young people killed," Pennington said.
But Bush spokesman Scott McClellan told the White House press corps that while Bush has favored keeping the ban since his 2000 campaign, "the president doesn't set the congressional timetable."
In March, Bush opposed an attempt in the Senate to add an extension of the ban to a bill designed to limit liability lawsuits against gun manufacturers and dealers.
Bush's Democratic challenger, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, was among the senators who nevertheless voted to add the ban to the bill, which was then killed after the National Rifle Association said the amendment was unacceptable.
Polls regularly indicate that more than two-thirds of the public, and even one-third of NRA members, favor the ban. But NRA lobbyist Cox said that wouldn't influence Congress, because the ban was just as popular with the general public in 1994, when Democrats lost control of the House after adopting the anti-crime law that included the ban.
Then-President Bill Clinton estimated that campaigns by the NRA and other gun groups against the ban's supporters cost the Democrats at least 20 House seats that year.
"The ban is not only bad policy, it's bad politics," Cox said. "Once they get educated on an issue, our members and other gun owners are very intense."
In fact, the House is expected to vote within a few weeks on a bill sponsored by Rep. Mark Souder, R-Ind., that would let members showcase their opposition to other gun control laws. His press secretary, Martin Green, said Souder received a commitment from the leadership for a floor vote sometime this year on his bill, which would repeal a local law in the District of Columbia that requires private owners to register their handguns and store them safely and unloaded.
International Association of Chiefs of Police: www.theiacp.org
National Rifle Association: www.nra.org
Andrew Mollison is a Washington correspondent for Cox Newspapers.