ATF Director: 'Assault Weapons' Ban on 'Wish List'

During a recent discussion on gun violence at Harvard, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) Director Steven Dettelbach said that banning "assault weapons" is on his gun control "wish list."

Dettelbach's comments came during an interview with historian Caroline Light at the Harvard Kennedy School on Oct. 30. Light serves as the director and senior lecturer in undergraduate studies of women, sexuality and gender.

When the audience was permitted to ask questions, Dettelbach was asked about gun control measures on his "wish list."

"I think that it would be helpful if we had universal background checks in this country," he said, according to Harvard Magazine. "I think that's something that seems to make some sense."

He also said he'd like to revive the 1994-2004 federal "assault weapons" ban.

"I agree that we ought to consider and actually reinstate a ban on certain types of assault weapons," he reportedly said.

Dettelbach's agency proposed a new rule in August that would require thousands more firearms dealers to conduct background checks.

"This new proposed rule would clarify the circumstances in which a person is ‘engaged in the business' of dealing in firearms, and thus required to obtain a license and follow the laws Congress has established for firearms dealers," the ATF director said in a release at the time.

People who sell guns at shows or online would be required to be licensed and run background checks on potential buyers under the rule proposed by the ATF.

If enacted, the rule would affect 24,500 to 328,000 sellers, the agency said, adding that the proposed regulation is aimed at gun retailers, not those with personal collections.

"People who grow up in communities with a lot of guns have told me … you never give a gun to a stranger, right?" Dettelbach said during the Harvard interview. "And so why would you let somebody buy a firearm without passing a simple background check?"

Dettelbach said it's important to "revive this idea of both respecting rights, but respecting the responsibility that comes with those rights."

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