Fact Check: Did Joe Biden Ban Assault Weapons?

President Joe Biden this week reiterated his support for new, tougher gun laws, demanding a new ban on assault weapons nationwide.

In a speech Tuesday at a gun safety summit, just hours after his son Hunter was convicted on federal gun charges, the president condemned the opponent's record Donald Trump's gun control policies while defending his own achievements.

To applause from the crowd, the president reiterated his call to “ban assault weapons,” as he claimed to have done when he was a senator from Delaware in 1994.

Requirement

During a speech at the Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund annual conference at Gun Sense University in Washington, DC on June 11, 2024, Biden said he banned assault weapons when he was U.S. senator from Delaware.

“My friends, you are changing the nation that you truly are, you are changing the nation. This builds on the dozen executive actions my administration has taken to
reduce gun violence, more than any of my predecessors, and I suspect more than all of them combined,” Biden said.

“Everything from cracking down on ghost guns, arms trafficking, and more. Were not stopping there, it is time once again to do what I did when I was a senator, ban assault weapons.”

Facts

While it is true that Biden helped pass legislation that led to a ban on certain assault weapons in 1994, the scope of that action merits further examination.

As chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Biden helped sign into law the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994 which prohibited “the manufacture, transfer, or possession of a weapon semi-automatic assault rifle.

This prohibited the sale of a number of specific weapons, modifications, and high-capacity ammunition devices “that can be easily restored or converted to accept more than 10 rounds of ammunition.”

However, as a 1999 National Institute of Justice article points out, it still exempts prohibited weapons purchased before its passage, and that only minor adjustments to a firearm, such as shortening its barrel by just a few millimeters, were “sufficient to transform a firearm”. banned weapon into a legal substitute.

Additionally, the ban expired in 2004 after Congress failed to reauthorize it. Only 18 specific models of firearms have been banned. A 2004 report to the National Institute of Justice provided examples of the numerous loopholes available to circumvent certain bans.

The report notes that cosmetic changes such as the removal of a bayonet weapon were “sufficient to transform a banned weapon into a legal substitute.”

The ban also did not apply to semi-automatics with more than one military style listed in its provisions. The report stated that Intratec, whose TEC-9 submachine gun was among the specified banned models, was capable of manufacturing a “post-ban” model that removed features such as a threaded barrel or barrel shroud, but which was otherwise identical to the TEC-9. 9 and was able to accept grandfathered 32-round magazines.

“The gun ban provision targets a relatively small number of weapons based on
on exterior features or accessories that have little to do with the operation of the weapon,” he said.

“Removal of some or all of these features is sufficient to make the weapons legal. In other respects (e.g., type of firing mechanism, ammunition fired, and ability to accept a detachable magazine), AW [automatic weapons] no different from other legal semi-automatic weapons.

The most recent and significant gun control legislation dates from 2022. Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. He created new sanctions for “straw buying,” strengthening laws intended to protect guns from domestic abusers and gun dealers, and created new funds to allow states to administer “alert” laws, allowing courts to order firearms kept away from people considered a danger to themselves or others.

However, unlike the 1994 bill, it also abandoned any attempt to ban military-style rifles in order to shore up Republican support.

decision

Needs context.

Joe Biden helped pass legislation banning “assault weapons” in 1994, which banned the sale of a number of specific models of firearms and devices that could hold “more than 10 rounds.”

However, it had a number of shortcomings. This allowed existing weapons to be grandfathered in, with manufacturers still able to make nearly identical versions of specific banned models. The law expired in 2004 after Congress failed to reauthorize it.

FACT CHECKING BY Newsweek Fact Check Team