Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.) said Tuesday that passing a ban on assault weapons or high-capacity magazines will be a hard sell with some of her House Democratic colleagues.
“I know that, at least on the Democratic side, I think there will be some who will vote against passing an assault-weapons ban, who would probably vote against large magazines of bullets,” said Sanchez, a liberal Democrat, in an interview with MSNBC.
“So I think it's going to be very difficult, much more difficult than most people realize,” she added.
The California lawmaker said the toughest Democrats to convince will probably be those from more rural areas in the South or the Midwest, where their constituents largely support gun ownership and oppose bans such as the ones being floated by Vice President Biden’s gun violence prevention task force.
“They probably aren't worried about saying, ‘Hey, this is part of what we do, and we're not willing to budge on that,’ ” said Sanchez of her conservative Democratic colleagues.
The Biden group has been meeting for weeks about possible actions that President Obama or Congress could take to prevent future gun violence, in the aftermath of the mass shooting at an elementary school in Newtown, Conn., last month that killed 20 children.
Later this week — perhaps as soon as Wednesday — the White House is expected to unveil some, or all, of the 19 possible executive actions that it has determined the president could take to change the country’s gun laws.
For more on Sanchez's comments, click here.
