A bill requiring 18-20 year olds to hand over or transfer ownership of heretofore legally possessed “assault weapons” is gaining sponsors in the Illinois Senate after passing the House last month.
The bill, HB 1465, was sponsored in the House by Rep. Michelle Mussman (D-Schaumburg) and passed by a vote of 64-51 on February 28.
After being introduced in the upper house by Senate President John Cullerton (D-Chicago), the bill has added seven co-sponsors in the last week. Notable among them was Sen. Jim Oberweis (R-Sugar Grove), the NRA “A” rated 2014 Republican nominee for U.S. Senate.
The NRA-ILA described the weapons covered by HB 1465 as “commonly-owned semi-automatic firearms.” The bill also requires 18-20-year-olds to forfeit ownership of any magazines that hold more than ten rounds of ammunition.
The guns and magazines remain legal for persons 21 and up, but persons under 21 would have 90 days to give up ownership, should HB 1465 become law.
Fox 2 reports that critics of Mussman’s bill were taken aback by “the idea that the government would confiscate property.” Mussman responded to these concerns by assuring them “authorities will not visit homes to pick up weapons.” Rather, “a first offense for getting caught with prohibited firearms would be a misdemeanor offense.”
The push to force 18-20 year olds to give up the enumerated semiautomatic firearms is now under consideration by the Illinois Senate.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.