Armed white supremacist terrorists showing up at state capitols is a tactic that apparently works well, because Virginia lawmakers are now balking at new firearms legislation.
A Virginia Senate committee killed a bill on Monday that would have banned the sale of assault-style weapons and possession of high-capacity magazines, handing gun rights activists a rare win in a Capitol that Democrats won last year on the promise of sweeping gun control.
Gov. Ralph Northam (D) backed the legislation, part of a package of eight gun-control measures he advanced after a shooter killed 12 people at a Virginia Beach municipal building on May 31. Republicans’ refusal to act on those bills last summer, in a special session that they gaveled out in 90 minutes, became a rallying cry for Democrats in November elections. They flipped the state House and Senate blue for the first time in a generation.
The House has passed all eight of Northam's bills. But four Democrats — Sens. R. Creigh Deeds (Bath), John S. Edwards (Roanoke), Chap Petersen (Fairfax) and Scott A. Surovell (Fairfax) — sided with Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee to reject the assault weapons bill for the year. On a 10-to-5 vote, the committee sent the measure to the state's Crime Commission for study.
“Bunch of wimps,” Sen. L. Louise Lucas (D-Portsmouth) said from the dais, referring to the four.
Philip Van Cleave, the Virginia Citizens Defense League president who organized a huge gun rights rally in Richmond last month and encouraged “Second Amendment sanctuary” declarations across the state, celebrated on Twitter.
"VICTORY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" Van Cleave tweeted. "Everybody's hard work, Lobby Day, and sanctuary movement paid off!"
Northam was "disappointed" with the vote but "fully expects the Crime Commission to give this measure the detailed review that Senators called for. We will be back next year," spokeswoman Alena Yarmosky said in an email.
House Speaker Eileen Filler-Corn (D-Fairfax) — who had challenged the Senate to pass all eight bills in a speech over the weekend — reacted more sharply.
"The Democratic platform last fall was very clear," she said in a statement. "Limiting access to weapons of war used in mass murder was a key part of that platform. The House of Delegates delivered on our promise to take action to keep those weapons off our streets. To call today's vote by the Senate Judiciary Committee a disappointment would be an understatement."
It's not all bad news though. Of the other seven gun safety bills that passed Virginia's general assembly, five passed in the state Senate, including universal background checks, a "red flag" law, allowing the government to ban weapons in public buildings and events, limiting handgun purchases to one per month (something that actually was in effect until Republicans overturned it in 2012), and a law to strengthen prohibiting firearms access to a person under a protective order.
In addition to the assault weapon and magazine ban, a measure requiring a gun owner to report a missing firearm to police within 24 hours and a felony measure that would raise the age of "child access prevention" when leaving a gun unattended with a minor being able to access it from 14 to 18 both failed. Those three bills were easily the most controversial, and they all were blocked by state Senate Democrats who wimped out.
And if the name Creigh Deeds sounds familiar, he's the Democratic candidate for Governor who lost to Bob McDonnell in 2009 in a landslide, who went on to become a precursor to Trump corruption.
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