Altitude Sickness: Colorado Lawmakers Introduce An Authoritarian Gun Ban Bill

A long time ago, Colorado was my dream state. I liked their “live free” mindset and really wanted to move there. That was about 15-20 years ago though, and since then, Colorado has slowly and steadily moved towards statism. In 2013, Colorado lawmakers passed their first round of gun control after Sandy Hook and got punished by voters in recall elections. But a decade is an eternity in politics, and Colorado has become even more statist with the march of time.

Colorado lawmakers (whose political bent you can easily guess) just introduced one of the worst gun control bills in state history. You can read the text of the bill in its entirety here (archived link). Here’s a quick summary of this abomination:

• The bill defines a “specified semiautomatic firearm” as a semiautomatic rifle, shotgun with a detachable magazine, or gas-operated semiautomatic handgun with a detachable magazine.

• Prohibited Activities:

  • Starting September 1, 2025, it will be unlawful to knowingly manufacture, distribute, transfer, sell, or purchase a specified semiautomatic firearm.

  • Violations: A violation of this provision is a Class 2 misdemeanor for the first offense, escalating to a Class 6 felony for second or subsequent offenses.

• Rapid-Fire Device Classification:

• Transfer Restrictions:

  • Restrictions also apply to transfers to certain entities, such as museums, as long as the firearm is rendered permanently inoperable.

First of all, the bill targets all semi-autos. As for handguns, it sounds like revolvers are in, pistols are out.

Second, pay close attention to the language of what’s prohibited: it includes the word “manufacture.” In other words, it’s a ban on self-made semi-automatic guns, and that’s not just 3-D printed guns, it’s everything in that space. The other prohibited activities – “distribute, transfer, sell, or purchase” – make not just commerce impossible, but also non-commercial transfers. 

Third, it includes a ban on “rapid-fire devices,” so they’re also banning bump stocks, binary triggers, forced reset triggers, and Glock switches.

The transfer restrictions apply even to museums and public collections unless the firearms are made permanently inoperable.

Of course, the guns are not good enough for you and me, but they’re good for the agents of the State. And if you’re the child of the owner of a grandfathered pre-ban semi-automatic, you can inherit one, but if you’re an orphan or the child of a non-gun owner, good luck getting one for yourself.

The humiliation being dished out to the public is only made worse by the rationale claimed by the bill’s authors and sponsors:

SECTION 9. Safety clause. The general assembly finds, determines, and declares that this act is necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health, or safety or for appropriations for the support and maintenance of the departments of the state and state institutions.

So this gun ban is absolutely important for the immediate preservation of the public peace, but heirs inheriting the banned guns obviously won’t disturb the public peace. 

And what about the exception to transfer the guns to residents of other states? Using the logic of the bill’s safety clause, does that mean Colorado is allowing the exportation of harm to other states?

This bill is an authoritarian move, pure and simple. It’s shocking that out of 35 members of the Colorado State Senate, 17 are sponsors – that’s almost 50%. In comparison, out of the 65 members of the Colorado House of Representatives, “only” 25 are sponsors, but that’s still a shockingly high number.

I don’t follow Colorado state politics enough to know what the odds of this bill are. But given Colorado’s trend over the past 2 decades, I won’t be surprised if it gets passed by the legislature. At that point, its fate will rest in the hands of the allegedly libertarian Democrat Gov. Jared Polis, who I find utterly untrustworthy.

The only laugh I’m getting out of this bill is that one of the House sponsors is named Camacho. That’s the namesake of the U.S. President in the cult classic movie Idiocracy, which Colorado voters seem to be taking inspiration from.

Second Amendment advocates in Colorado aren’t going to be laughing, though, because they have a steep Rocky Mountain to climb to stop this bill from becoming law in the first place.