[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 150 (2004), Part 10]
[Senate]
[Pages 12703-12704]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                       HALT THE ASSAULT BUS TOUR

  Mr. LEVIN. Mr. President, this week, the Million Mom March entered 
the tenth week of its ``Halt the Assault'' bus tour. The bus tour is 
traveling across America in a pink RV and making stops in nearly every 
major metropolitan area in the country. Their message is simple. They 
are asking Congress and President Bush to act now to reauthorize the 
assault weapons ban. They are in Illinois this week and they will be in 
my home State of Michigan at the beginning of August. I hope folks in 
each State will join them to help convey their important message.
  In addition to banning 19 specific weapons, the ban makes it illegal 
to ``manufacture, transfer, or possess a semiautomatic'' firearm that 
can accept a detachable magazine and has more than one of several 
specific military features, such as folding/telescoping stocks, 
protruding pistol grips, bayonet mounts, threaded muzzles or flash 
suppressors, barrel shrouds, or grenade launchers. These weapons are 
dangerous and they should not be on America's streets.
  The ban was designed to reduce the criminal use of military-style 
semiautomatic firearms, and it has done just that. According to 
statistics reported by the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence, from 
1990 to 1994, assault weapons named in the ban constituted 4.82 percent 
of guns traced in criminal investigations. However, since

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the ban's enactment, these assault weapons have made up only 1.61 
percent of the crime-related guns traced.
  According to the Brady Campaign, throughout the 1980s, law 
enforcement officials reported that assault weapons were the ``weapons 
of choice'' for drug traffickers, gangs, terrorists, and paramilitary 
extremist groups. In response, our Nation's first responders asked 
Congress and President Bush to limit access to such weapons so that our 
streets and communities might be safer.
  In order to keep these deadly, military-style weapons out of our 
communities, America's moms are joining gun safety groups and the law 
enforcement community in urging us to extend this critical gun safety 
law that is about to expire. Without action, firearms like UZIs, AK-
47s, and other semiautomatic assault weapons could begin to find their 
way back onto our streets again.
  Unfortunately, despite Senate passage of a bipartisan amendment that 
would have reauthorized the ban, it appears that this important gun 
safety law will be allowed to expire on September 13, 2004. The House 
Republican leadership opposes reauthorizing the law and President Bush, 
though he has said he supports it, has done little to help keep the law 
alive. I hope all of my colleagues will join me in thanking America's 
moms for their efforts in the battle to reauthorize the assault weapon 
ban.

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