ALBUQUERQUE, NM — In an interview last night with Alicia Menendez on MSNBC, Senator Martin Heinrich chided his Republican colleagues for reversing course and blocking his bipartisan legislation to ban bump stocks, and laid out what’s at stake for voters in the 2024 election.

VIDEO: Martin Heinrich joins MSNBC to discuss his legislation to ban bump stocks and what’s at stake in the 2024 election

“I think a lot of my colleagues are not taking on the gun lobby at all. I am a gun owner, I have been a gun owner almost my entire life. These things just do not belong in the hands of civilians, they are effectively machine guns. We have lived in this country with a law against machine guns for almost 100 years, and how this is any different is beyond me. And I think Justice Sotomayor said it best: if something walks like a duck, and swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I am going to say it is a duck. These are machine guns and have no place on the streets,” Heinrich said.

“I hope that the [Senate Majority] Leader puts this on the floor. I think that we should make sure that the American people know where every one of us stands on such a common-sense gun safety issue,” Heinrich continued.

Asked how to set the stakes of the 2024 election for voters, Heinrich said, “People need to understand that this Supreme Court can take away your freedoms and they have a history of, as they did in the Dobbs decision, coming right for the freedoms that many Americans cherish the most. That is what is at stake in this election. It is your freedom to choose, your freedom to vote, your freedom to feel safe in a movie theater or at your church. That is what is at stake in this election.”

Heinrich authored the bipartisan legislation that would permanently ban bump stocks. He was part of the core group that negotiated the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act — the first significant federal gun safety legislation to become law in 30 years — specifically leading the successful effort to increase criminal penalties for straw purchases and stop illegal gun trafficking out of our country.

Watch the full interview here.

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