Tonight, Wash­ing­ton took a big step towards a safer future with the House of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives’ approval of leg­is­la­tion request­ed by Attor­ney Gen­er­al Fer­gu­son and Gov­er­nor Inslee that would final­ly ban mil­i­tary-style assault weapons.

By a vote of 55–38, the House sent HB 1240 on to the Sen­ate for fur­ther con­sid­er­a­tion. Prime spon­sored by Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Strom Peter­son, the bill “prohibits the man­u­fac­ture, impor­ta­tion, dis­tri­b­u­tion, sale, or offer for sale of any assault weapon, sub­ject to var­i­ous excep­tions for licensed firearm man­u­fac­tur­ers and deal­ers, and for indi­vid­u­als who inher­it an assault weapon.”

It also pro­vides that “a vio­la­tion of these restric­tions con­sti­tutes a gross mis­de­meanor and is action­able under the Con­sumer Pro­tec­tion Act.”

“The House today put pub­lic safe­ty above the inter­est of the gun lob­by,” Attor­ney Gen­er­al Bob Fer­gu­son said. “The dev­as­ta­tion of mass shoot­ings extends far beyond the casu­al­ties and injuries. Mass shoot­ings trau­ma­tize entire com­mu­ni­ties. We must stop sell­ing these weapons of war in Washington.”

“Assault weapons have con­tributed to some of the dead­liest shoot­ings over the last decade, and keep­ing more of them out of our com­mu­ni­ties will make Wash­ing­ton a safer place,” Gov­er­nor Jay Inslee said.

“I applaud the bill spon­sors and the Attor­ney General’s Office for help­ing advance this cru­cial pub­lic safe­ty measure.”

“We have a cri­sis of gun vio­lence in this coun­try, and it is only esca­lat­ing,” Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Peter­son (also a Sno­homish Coun­ty Coun­cilmem­ber) observed.

“Too many of our neigh­bors’ lives have been cut short. In 2016, a 19-year-old here in Muk­il­teo used an assault rifle to end three lives and upend count­less more. I am proud that we passed this leg­is­la­tion off of the House floor. We need to con­tin­ue to take real, tan­gi­ble action to curb gun vio­lence in our state. Get­ting this bill to the governor’s desk will be a major step forward.”

“It is time we put chil­dren before the gun indus­try and peo­ple before prof­it,” said Sen­a­tor Pat­ty Kud­er­er, prime spon­sor of the com­pan­ion bill in the Sen­ate. Kud­er­er rep­re­sents NPI’s home­town of Red­mond along with Sen­a­tor Man­ka Dhingra.

“We passed com­mon-sense gun safe­ty leg­is­la­tion last year because the data shows when shoot­ers have more bul­lets, they use them. We’re back this year because the research tells us when shoot­ers get to attach red dot sites, fore­grips, col­lapsi­ble butt­stocks and lasers: they use them in our class­rooms. Assault weapons are favored by mass shoot­ers pre­cise­ly because they are able to mow down many peo­ple in a short peri­od of time. This isn’t a game. This is real and these are the lives of our most vul­ner­a­ble com­mu­ni­ty mem­bers. There is no place for weapons of war on our streets, our schools and in our neighborhoods.”

The Attor­ney Gen­er­al’s press release cel­e­brat­ing the pas­sage of the bill not­ed that the North­west Pro­gres­sive Insti­tute’s polling has found extreme­ly strong sup­port among like­ly vot­ers in Wash­ing­ton for an assault weapons ban.

That sup­port stood at 56% last June and was sub­se­quent­ly cor­rob­o­rat­ed by a poll con­duct­ed by Sur­veyUSA for its part­ners. A new statewide NPI poll just back from the field today found that sup­port had increased slight­ly, to 58%, which shows that vot­er enthu­si­asm for this crit­i­cal law is not only rock sol­id, but growing.

Our team is very hap­py to see this bill leave the House as the final action tak­en on cut­off day. It’s about time! Thank you, Representatives!

The roll call was as follows:

Roll Call
HB 1240
Firearms/assault weapons
3rd Read­ing & Final Passage
3/8/2023

Yeas: 55; Nays: 42; Excused: 1

Vot­ing Yea: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Alvara­do, Bate­man, Berg, Bergquist, Berry, Bronoske, Callan, Chap­man, Chopp, Cortes, Davis, Doglio, Don­aghy, Duerr, Enten­man, Fari­var, Fey, Fitzgib­bon, Fos­se, Good­man, Gregerson, Hack­ney, Klo­ba, Leav­itt, Lekanoff, Macri, Mena, Mor­gan, Orms­by, Ortiz-Self, Orwall, Paul, Peter­son, Pol­let, Ramel, Ramos, Reed, Reeves, Ric­cel­li, Ryu, San­tos, Senn, Sim­mons, Slat­ter, Springer, Stearns, Stonier, Street, Tay­lor, Thai, Tharinger, Tim­mons, Walen, Wylie, Jinkins

Vot­ing Nay: Rep­re­sen­ta­tives Abbarno, Barkis, Barnard, Caldier, Cham­bers, Chan­dler, Cheney, Chris­t­ian, Con­nors, Cor­ry, Cou­ture, Dent, Dye, Eslick, Goehn­er, Gra­ham, Grif­fey, Har­ris, Hutchins, Jacob­sen, Klick­er, Kretz, Low, May­cum­ber, McClin­tock, McEn­tire, Mos­bruck­er, Orcutt, Robert­son, Rude, Rule, San­dlin, Schmick, Schmidt, Shavers, Steele, Stokes­bary, Volz, Walsh, Waters, Wilcox, Ybarra

Excused: Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Hansen

No Repub­li­cans sup­port­ed the bill. That’s dis­ap­point­ing, but not unexpected.

Two Democ­rats vot­ed nay: New State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Clyde Shavers (D‑10th Dis­trict: Island and Sno­homish Coun­ties) and State Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Ali­cia Rule (D‑42nd Dis­trict: What­com Coun­ty). Rep­re­sen­ta­tive Drew Hansen, who is bat­tling COVID-19, was excused from the vote. The cau­cus could have afford­ed to have lost five more votes and still passed the bill. How­ev­er, it passed more com­fort­ably than that, show­ing that Democ­rats know this is leg­is­la­tion the peo­ple want.

HB 1240 now heads to the Wash­ing­ton State Sen­ate for fur­ther consideration.

What a great vic­to­ry to be able to cel­e­brate on the final day for bills to be con­sid­ered in their cham­ber of ori­gin in the 2023 leg­isla­tive session!