Republicans Block Senate Democrats’ Efforts to Ban Guns, Expand Background Checks

Republicans blocked Democrat efforts in the Senate to ban certain types of semi-automatic rifles and to require universal criminal background checks for firearms sales on Dec. 6. Sen. John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) objected to a call for unanimous consent on a so-called “assault weapons ban” by Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Senate Majority leader. Mr. Schumer said that violent crime involving firearms has become an “epidemic.” “The American people are sick and tired of enduring one mass shooting after another,” he said. He claimed that the “Federal Assault Weapons Ban” between 1994 and 2004 reduced the number of mass killings and gun crimes. “We have a decade’s worth of proof that a ban on military-style assaults [weapons] works and saves lives, plain and simple,” Mr. Schumer said....