WASHINGTON — With the assault-weapons ban off the table, Sen. Harry Reid is cooking up a gun-control bill that focuses on universal backgrounds checks, limits on high-capacity ammunition clips and stiffer penalties on criminal traffickers.
Reid (D-Nev.), the majority leader, hopes to have a new package ready after the Easter recess.
“That’s the idea,” Reid told The Post yesterday, a day after he admitted that he did not have the votes to ram the tough package that included the assault ban through the Senate.
Freshman Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Conn.), whose former congressional district included Newtown, said limiting magazine clips was key.
“For a lot of families in Newtown, the most important reform would be banning these high-capacity magazines,” he said.
Background checks must also be a priority, he added.
Now, only firearms sold by licensed dealers face that scrutiny. Critics say that means four of every 10 guns in America are sold without background checks.
Even a parent who lost a child in the Dec. 14 school massacre in Newtown said yesterday the assault-weapons ban — which he supports — might have doomed the legislation.
“You’re better to get some progress rather than no progress at all,” said Neil Heslin, a construction worker whose 6-year-old son, Jesse Lewis, was shot to death.
Newtown family members will be voicing their opinions about gun-control legislation in Manhattan today, when they meet at 11 a.m. at City Hall with Vice President Joe Biden and Mayor Bloomberg.
Meanwhile, Gov. Cuomo admitted yesterday that a a part of his gun bill that outlaws the purchase of any magazines that carry more than seven bullets was unworkable. “There is no such thing as a seven-bullet magazine. That doesn’t exist, so you really have no practical option,” Cuomo said.
New Yorkers can buy the 10-round magazines but can only keep seven bullets in them, the governor proposed.
Also, state’s strict new gun laws were tested in the town of Hanover as the first person to be charged under them pleaded not guilty to selling illegal weapons, according to The Buffalo News.