this bill is an essential first step to pushing back against years and years of bad supreme court precedent on this. I don’t expect a court victory, but instead, hope that people will start standing up and exercising their rights whether or not the courts want to give us permission to or not.

Federal firearm legislation is based on the Constitution's Commerce Clause. In essence, Congress is saying that because guns cross and are sold across state lines, it has the power to regulate them.

If you understand that, you'll also understand why this bill is unnecessary, firearms manufactured and sold within the state aren't subject to Federal Regulation under the Commerce Clause.

So for all you who support this bill, you are supporting a waste of time that in all likelihood is just a publicity stunt to shore up support from some Republican's base.

Also I'm a Democrat who supports guns rights. If you register your weapons and are informed on how to use them effectively, I see no problem with people owning military style weapons (assault riffles, large caliber machine guns).

There are probably a lot more supporters of this bill (especially percentage-wise) east of the Cascade mountains.