Skip To Content
JEWISH. INDEPENDENT. NONPROFIT.
Fast Forward

Jewish Florida Congressman Cosponsors Assault Rifle Ban Bill

Two Jewish Democratic lawmakers introduced Monday legislation calling for the ban of assault riffles following the school shooting in Parkland, Florida.

The bill, sponsored by Reps. Ted Deutch, whose Florida congressional district includes Parkland, and David Cicilline from Rhode Island, would outlaw the import, sale, manufacturing, transfer, or possession of semiautomatic assault weapons, thus renewing a previous law that expired in 2004.

The proposed ban targets guns with military-style features allowing them to use high capacity magazines and other firearms defined as assault rifles.

“Americans don’t own tanks or missiles; so why should our streets be flooded with weapons of war made for the sole purpose of killing people?” Deutch said in a statement, noting that banning assault rifles was supported in the past by Republicans too, including President Reagan. Cicilline added that “assault weapons were made for one purpose. They are designed to kill as many people as possible in a short amount of time. They do not belong in our communities.”

The bill does not have at this point any Republican support and therefore is unlikely to pass Congress.

Contact Nathan Guttman at [email protected] or on Twitter @nathanguttman

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

—  Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO

With your support, we’ll be ready for whatever 2025 brings.

Republish This Story

Please read before republishing

We’re happy to make this story available to republish for free, unless it originated with JTA, Haaretz or another publication (as indicated on the article) and as long as you follow our guidelines. You must credit the Forward, retain our pixel and preserve our canonical link in Google search.  See our full guidelines for more information, and this guide for detail about canonical URLs.

To republish, copy the HTML by clicking on the yellow button to the right; it includes our tracking pixel, all paragraph styles and hyperlinks, the author byline and credit to the Forward. It does not include images; to avoid copyright violations, you must add them manually, following our guidelines. Please email us at [email protected], subject line “republish,” with any questions or to let us know what stories you’re picking up.

We don't support Internet Explorer

Please use Chrome, Safari, Firefox, or Edge to view this site.