Amid the many gaffes, mispronunciations, mumbling, and yelling of President Joe Biden's State of the Union address on Tuesday was a rather revelatory moment in terms of his true agenda with regard to the American people's Second Amendment-protected right to keep and bear arms.
Biden twice referenced "semi-automatic" pistols in calling for a new ban on so-called "assault weapons," which suggests the president would like to ban the manufacture, sale, and possession of the vast majority of handguns in common use across the country, the Western Journal reported.
Thankfully, a proposed ban on semi-automatic handguns would be dead on arrival in the Republican-controlled House and likely wouldn't even clear the Democratic-controlled Senate, but even if it did somehow pass and be signed into law by Biden, it would almost certainly be immediately struck down by the federal courts as a grossly egregious infringement upon a fundamental constitutionally-guaranteed right for the American people.
At one point in President Biden's speech, while addressing the topic of "gun violence," he called attention to a young man who was a special invited guest and is inarguably a hero -- 26-year-old Brandon Tsay, who wrestled away the weapon used by a mass shooter following a horrific tragedy in Monterrey Park, California in January, and quite possibly prevented additional injury and death from occurring.
"And two weeks ago, during the Lunar New Year celebrations, he heard the studio door close, and he saw a man standing there pointing a semi-automatic pistol at him. He thought he was going to die, but he thought about the people inside," Biden said of Tsay.
"In that instant, he found the courage to act and wrestled the semi-automatic pistol away from the gunman who had already killed 11 people in another dance studio. Eleven," the president continued. "He saved lives. It’s time we do the same."
"Ban assault weapons now! Ban them now! Once and for all," Biden shouted to wild cheers and applause from his fellow Democrats. "I led the fight to do that in 1994. And in 10 years that ban was law, mass shootings went down. After we let it expire in a Republican administration, mass shootings tripled. Let’s finish the job and ban these assault weapons."
President Biden introduces Brandon Tsay, who disarmed the Monterey Park gunman:
"He saved lives. It’s time we do the same. Ban assault weapons now! Ban them now. Once and for all." https://t.co/qKzCwkne5X pic.twitter.com/Y07ZsdyevB
— NBC News (@NBCNews) February 8, 2023
For what it is worth, the weapon used in the Monterrey Park mass shooting was a "semi-automatic pistol," in that it has a short barrel and fires one round from a detachable ammunition magazine per trigger pull. However, that particular and rather unique firearm -- the Cobray M11 9mm with a 30-round magazine -- has been specifically banned in California for roughly three decades now, per Vox.
Whether President Biden is aware of that nuance is unclear, nor does it really matter, as his statement failed to even make an allusion to such a distinction and, instead, he came across as lumping all "semi-automatic" handguns in with so-called "assault weapons," which though vague and ever-expanding is nonetheless generally understood to apply to so-called "military-style" semi-automatic rifles like the AR-15 and AK-47 and their many similarly-styled variants.
Nor can this necessarily be dismissed as a mere gaffe or slip of the tongue, as Biden has previously suggested on several occasions that all semi-automatic handguns should be banned, with just one recent example coming on Thanksgiving Day last year.
"The idea we still allow semi-automatic weapons to be purchased is sick. It’s just sick. It has no, no social redeeming value. Zero. None. Not a single, solitary rationale for it except profit for the gun manufacturers," Biden told reporters after visiting with firefighters while vacationing on Nantucket Island.
It must also be noted that President Biden is not alone among Democrats in not-so-secretly wanting to ban the vast majority of handguns in common use, as evidenced by the standing ovation he received but also by an "assault weapons ban" bill filed by notorious gun-grabber Sen. Dianne Feinstein last month.
Her legislation, in the unlikely event it actually became law, would reclassify and ban virtually all semi-automatic weapons -- handguns, rifles, and shotguns alike -- if they featured a detachable ammunition magazine and one or more "military-style" characteristics like "a pistol grip, a forward grip, a barrel shroud, a threaded barrel, or a folding or telescoping stock," among other standard features, as well as those with magazines that hold more than 10 rounds.
