A proposal to outlaw a type of bullet used in AR-15 rifles is probably just the Obama administration riling up its gun-hating Democratic base and diverting the public's attention from other issues where this White House has not fared so well, says the president of the Independent Firearms Owners Association.
That's because a threatened federal ban on so-called "armor-piercing" AR-15 rifle bullets has no basis in either firearms technology or public safety trends, Richard Feldman, a former National Rifle Association lawyer, told "MidPoint" guest host John Bachman on
Newsmax TV Monday.
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"This administration doesn't like guns, and anything they can do to gun owners, they seem perfectly willing to accept and push," said Feldman. "It's politics as usual on the Obama administration's part."
The author of 2007's
"Ricochet: Confessions of a Gun Lobbyist" said that all rifle-caliber bullets are capable of penetrating soft body armor worn by law enforcement, so the armor-piercing classification is "really not the issue."
He also said that in the 30 years since bans on armor-piercing bullets became law in an effort to protect police, "there's not been a single police officer in this country shot at, let alone injured, let alone killed, with an armor-piercing round."
The
White House says the AR-15 ammunition ban will save police officers' lives but a Washington lobbyist for the Fraternal Order of Police questioned that assertion, saying "this specific round has historically not posed a law enforcement problem."
The move to reclassify popular green-tipped AR-15 rounds as armor-piercing, and therefore illegal, has gained political momentum because of the emergence of handgun-style AR-15 weapons, said Feldman.
Developed "largely for disabled individuals," the handgun-style AR-15 is "2 feet long and kind of hard to conceal," but its existence nevertheless allows the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to say the bullets in question are handgun-fireable and therefore a threat, said Feldman.
"The Obama administration and ATF is going to focus the attention of our country — when we have all sorts of very serious issues facing this republic — on a nonexistent problem because it's good politics for the administration and their supporters," he said.
Feldman also said that statistics on gun violence against law enforcement officers don't support a new ammunition ban.
"Far less police are killed annually or shot at now than 20 years ago," he said, adding, "It's not about an arms race; it's about specific individuals that are misusing guns."
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