ADVISORY: Heinrich, Colleagues to Urge Passage of BUMP Act on Senate Floor
Senate slated to vote on Heinrich’s legislation to ban bump stocks this afternoon
WASHINGTON — Today, U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.) will deliver remarks on the Senate floor, urging his colleagues to vote in favor of his Banning Unlawful Machinegun Parts (BUMP) Act through a unanimous consent request. The vote directly follows Friday’s ruling by the Supreme Court to overturn a Trump-era ban on bump stocks, devices designed to indiscriminately kill the highest number of people in the shortest amount of time.
The BUMP Act would statutorily ban the sale of deadly bump stock devices that allow semiautomatic weapons to rapidly fire multiple rounds like machine guns.
Tuesday, June 18
WHEN: 4:15pm ET / 2:15pm MT
WHO:
U.S. Senator Martin Heinrich (D-N.M.)
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.)
WHERE: Livestream link HERE.
Background on the BUMP Act:
After Friday’s ruling overturning the federal ban on bump stocks, Heinrich, Collins, and Cortez Masto announced growing support for their BUMP Act.
The new cosponsors of the BUMP Act are U.S. Senators Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.), John Fetterman (D-Pa.), Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.), Chris Coons (D-Del.), Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Mazie Hirono (D-Hawai'i), Bob Casey (D-Pa.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.), Tim Kaine (D-Va.), Tom Carper (D-Del.), Ben Cardin (D-Md.), Jack Reed (D-R.I.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), Joe Manchin (I-W.Va), Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), Michael Bennet (D-Colo.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawai'i), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
U.S. Representative Dina Titus (D-Nev.) has introduced companion legislation in the House. There are 145 total cosponsors of the BUMP Act in the House.
After the Supreme Court’s decision to overturn the federal ban on bump stocks, President Biden called on Congress to pass legislation banning bump stocks, stating that he would immediately sign it into law.
Heinrich, Cortez Masto, and former Senator Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) initially introduced the BUMP Act in the 115th Congress, prior to the Trump administration’s enactment of the rule banning bump stocks in 2018. Collins also cosponsored that legislation.
The BUMP Act has been endorsed by numerous gun safety organizations, including Everytown for Gun Safety, GIFFORDS, Brady, March for Our Lives, Newtown Action Alliance, March Fourth, Violence Policy Center, and New Mexicans to Prevent Gun Violence.
The full text of the BUMP Act is available here.
A fact sheet is available here.
Heinrich has introduced legislation to ban bump stocks and keep Americans safe from gun violence, while safeguarding Americans’ constitutional right to own a firearm for legitimate self-defense, hunting, and sporting purposes.
Last November, Heinrich and King introduced the Gas-Operated Semi-Automatic Firearms Exclusion (GOSAFE) Act, legislation to protect communities from gun violence, while safeguarding Americans’ constitutional right to own a firearm for legitimate self-defense, hunting, and sporting purposes. In addition to regulating the sale, transfer, and manufacture of gas-operated semi-automatic weapons, the GOSAFE Act would prevent unlawful modifications of permissible firearms, including bump stocks.
Heinrich and King introduced the GOSAFE Act in the Senate, alongside U.S. Senators Mark Kelly (D-Ariz.), and Michael Bennet (D-Colo.). The GOSAFE Act is cosponsored by U.S. Senators Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.), Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Ed Markey (D-Mass.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Alex Padilla (D-Calif.), and Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). Earlier this month, Heinrich announced that his GOSAFE Act has been introduced in the House by U.S. Representative Lucy McBath (D-Ga.).
Additional background on Heinrich's leadership to tackle gun violence:
Last month, Heinrich announced over $1 million he secured in the FY24 Appropriations Bills to purchase new National Integrated Ballistics Information Network (NIBIN) ballistics testing machines for law enforcement agencies in Las Cruces, Farmington, Gallup, and Roswell. The intelligence gathered by these machines will go to the New Mexico Attorney General’s Crime Gun Intelligence Center where dedicated and trained analysts will use the information to trace and network firearms used in crimes across the state. The Center will then be able to feed that information back to law enforcement agencies to improve identification of suspects and support successful prosecutions.
In March, in the FY24 Appropriations Bills, Heinrich also secured language directing the expanded use of NIBIN for state and local agencies in the Southwest Border region.
In July 2023, Heinrich cosponsored the bicameral Ghost Guns and Untraceable Firearms Act, legislation, led by Blumenthal, to require online and other sellers of gun-making kits to comply with federal firearm safety regulations.
Heinrich was also a member of the core bipartisan group that negotiated the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act— the first significant federal gun safety legislation to become law in 30 years— specifically working with Collins to lead the successful effort to increase criminal penalties for straw purchases and stop illegal gun trafficking out of our country.
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