How Utahns voted: see A3.A ban on certain assault-style weapons must survive tense negotiations on a more wide-ranging crime bill before it becomes law, tempering the euphoria of gun-control advocates celebrating a razor-thin House victory.
"My next priority is to get the crime bill passed and on the president's desk, with the assault weapons ban in it, as soon as we can," an ecstatic Rep. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., said after the House approved the ban he authored.To get there, the bill that squeaked through the House by a 216-214 vote Thursday - in a sharp rebuke to the National Rifle Association - next must get through a House-Senate conference to resolve differences in the two chambers' crime bills.
The Senate crime bill, passed in November, included an almost identical ban on assault-style weapons. The House crime bill, passed two weeks ago, didn't.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., who authored the amendment on the weapons ban, said she expected the conference committee to adopt the ban.
Schumer said he wasn't worried about a Senate filibuster if it is included in the crime bill because those participating would be delaying passage of the bill's many popular features.
The assault-weapons provision barely survived a Senate vote last November before it became part of the crime bill, and it won Thursday on a last-minute vote switch by Rep. Andrew Jacobs, D-Ind.
Nevertheless, Feinstein predicted victory even if the provision is subjected to more congressional votes on its own.
One Democratic House conferee, however, is a staunch opponent of the ban: House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jack Brooks, D-Texas. He led the Democratic opposition on the House floor.
"In passing this legislation, the House has unduly infringed upon the constitutional rights of millions of Americans on the basis of myth, misinformation and media hype," Brooks said after the vote. "In contrast, the criminals will flout this statute and flash a deadly smile as they do so."
Thursday's vote was another setback for the NRA, which lost big six months ago when Congress passed the Brady law requiring five-day waits and background checks on handgun buyers.
Wayne LaPierre, NRA executive vice president, called the vote "just another example of politicians taking the easy way out, rather than addressing the real problem of violent criminals. It is nothing more than pretend crime control that leads to more and more victims - innocent people victimized by repeat violent offenders."