Tag Archives: 1994 Federal Assault Weapons Ban

An artifact from the Federal AWB Era

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Some 30 years ago this month, on Sept. 13, 1994, H.R.3355, the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act of 1994, became public law.

Signed by President Bill Clinton (D), the elephantine 356-page bill was a mash-up of pork, prison, penalties, and programs of the sort commonly crafted on Capitol Hill. Its most contentious section was an amendment by U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) to stop the sale and manufacture of “assault weapons” as defined through an arbitrary process of cosmetic features and the ability to accept a detachable magazine, as well as magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds.

A silly relic of the 1989 California, and subsequent 1994 AWB below: the bayonet-neutered SKS. For a decade it was legal to sell the otherwise featureless rifle, with its 10-shot internal magazine, so long as the bayonet was dismounted.

You could still buy the bayonet as a curio – usually on the same table as the SKS at the gun show. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)

End of the line for VEPR?

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A classic Molot VEPR in .308 with the long 22-inch barrel and Counter Sniper Mil-Dot 4-16x44mm optic with illuminated reticle. Now more expensive than ever!

Back in January, I spoke at length with people over at Molot who were working hard on extending their exports of VEPR rifles and shotguns to the U.S. They were hopeful that the new Trump administration would be friendly to lifting some sanctions on Russian-based companies. Russian-made firearms were popular export items to the states until the conflict in the Ukraine and the resulting international backlash triggered a host of official embargos.

Per figures from the International Trade Commission, 204,788 firearms of all kinds were imported from Russia in 2013.

This figure plunged to just 9,556 in 2015 — mainly from Molot, the only large firearms maker not named in sanctions.

Well, it looks like that figure is going to be a lot lower in 2018…

Will Russian AKs and Korean war surplus M1s come ashore post-Trump?

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Some are hopeful the new management in Washington will be able to lift barriers to overseas firearm imports erected over the years, though the going could be slow.

President Donald Trump on Friday said it was “very early” to tell if the United States should lift sanctions on Russia, but that he seeks a “great relationship” with Putin and Russia.

On the campaign trail, Trump’s platform on trade concentrated on American jobs while floating the possibility of a tariff on all imported goods to help ease the current trade deficit. However, the Republican’s position on gun rights promised to curtail federal gun bans and limits. The two concepts, when balanced against one another, leaves open the possibility of action on foreign-made guns currently off-limits to buyers in the U.S.

I talked to industry insiders on both sides of the pond, the ATF, and the International Trade Commission to get the scoop on if bans going back to the 1960s could be reshaped.

More in my column at Guns.com