An effort by anti-gun lawmakers to overturn Maine Gov. Janet Mills’ veto of the state’s “assault weapon” ban legislation has failed.

On Friday, the state Senate voted 18-16 to overturn the governor’s veto of LD 2086. However, that vote fell far short of the two-thirds needed to overturn the veto.

While referred to as a “bump stock ban” by supporters in the legislature, the measure actually would have gone far beyond banning those devices. The legislation would actually have created a backdoor ban on commonly owned firearms and firearm parts by redefining a “machine gun” to include any semi-automatic firearm that includes parts that could “increase the rate of fire.”

Not a staunch gun-rights supporter, Gov. Mills nevertheless realized that the measure’s poorly written language might have had devastating effects on lawful Maine gun owners, hence the veto. Mills said she agreed that semi-automatic firearms converted into the functional equivalent of a machine gun should be restricted, but said she was concerned that certain language in the bill could have a “risk for unintended consequences.”

“Such legislation should only be developed in a deliberate, inclusive and clear manner for both gun safety advocates and those concerned with protecting lawful access to firearms,” Mills said in the veto message.

While originally faced with a number of anti-gun measures likely due to last fall’s mass murder in Lewiston, Maine gun owners have managed to fend off most of the efforts. Not all of them, though.

The governor allowed a measure requiring a three-day waiting period before gun purchasers who have already passed the federal background check can have a new gun transferred to them. She also signed bills making it easier to confiscate firearms without due process, requiring background checks for private sales through online means and strengthening a law that forbids “reckless” sale of a gun to a prohibited person.

Prior to the override vote for the AWB measure and several others, Republican Rep. Mike Soboleski was hopeful the vetoes would be sustained.

“We fought hard on all of these, we fought very hard,” Rep. Mike Soboleski told WMTV. “This is our day to get a little bit back, and we’ll sustain them all.”

Proponents of the measure, however, were disheartened by the failed override vote.

“I’m really disappointed it was vetoed,” said Sen. Anne Carney, who sponsored several pieces of anti-gun legislation this session. “I think it’s a big issue of public safety.”

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22 COMMENTS

  1. The “gun community” has been trying to avoid the “machine gun question” for decades now.

    Now, everybody needs to start articulating. Why it’s important for you to be able to have a machine gun. Why you should have one because it’s your right to have one.

    And why that freedom is so important for our individual liberty. Because semi automatic guns were regularly converted to machine guns, in 1920s. It was legal to do so back then.

    And people should be articulating the responsibility and the consequences. That go along with possessing and using machine guns.

    • Why do citizens need machine guns ???
      Answer : Rodney King Riots, where LAPD was “First To Flee” as soon as the insurrection started. Citizens who were armed with MSRs survived; lesser armed folks were killed….63 of them. Government can NEVER be depended on to protect you.

  2. Most in the “gun community” don’t know this. But there were videos and books on the internet, that explained how to convert a ruger 1022 into an MG.

    I have not seen them lately.

    • information is still available via the internet, in lots of places. Just to check, I downloaded a .pdf with full instructions and its the real thing. Its knowledge that’s been out there for many years. There is video on a certain site but its ‘obfuscated’ by titles and segmented in parts so ya gotta get creative with searches on google or bing – there is also other ‘whole’ videos on other ‘video platforms’. There’s even various companies that provide download or supply the needed information.

      No, i’m not going to post links to these.

      • Yes, now you really do have to be creative to find this stuff. I have had the links for years now. And Have the paperwork card copies too.

        And No. I also will no provide links to this information.
        And yes I have a 1st amendment right to read what ever I want to. And to keeping it in my library.

        Unfortunately the “free speech freaks” keep on talking about pornography.

        You will never find them supporting the First Amendment right to access machine gun conversion information.

        Those freaks are only about the “soft things” in life. They are never about the difficult things in life.

  4. No one is going to burn enough books. Or burn down enough internet web sites. To stop the MG conversion information, from getting out to people who want to use it.

    The genie is out of the bottle and it’s not going back in.

    It’s time to promote responsible machine gun ownership. And it’s time to promote ammunition conservation.

    And how about promoting the traditional family of one man and one woman. Instead of promoting single motherhood. With a woman with five kids from five different men. And no man in the home.

    So a father can be around to provide discipline and love, to his children who have machine guns. Because very soon machine guns WILL BECOME very common in the USA.

    See the Bruen decision for a reference.

    “common use”

    • Chris, I’m not seeing what you see. Machine guns are still NFA items. New-manufacture machine guns are still restricted from 1986 on so that machine guns and auto sears are prohibitively expensive even if the ATF approves your application. So no, legal machine guns will not be common in the USA. I don’t want to spend $18,000 just to own a machine gun.

      • I don’t want to lose my civil rights because of some hysterical uneducated women. And many don’t have a man in their life. Who would show them that guns are not something to be frightened of.

      • The gun Smith cost, as well as the waiting time, it takes to convert to an MG are way down now.

        This is the point that Cody Wilson was trying to get people to understand many years ago. Advanced technology, advanced materials. Advanced manufacturing methods, have democratized machine gun production. And all gun production.

        It has lowered the cost to make them.

        And let’s be honest. I don’t want to lose my civil rights. Because some Caucasian Libertarian is going to complain about too many black children being locked up. Because they broke the gun laws.

        People who break the law should be punished and not let go to run around free. Because these self hating idiots compare US Jails to other societies jails. They believe the jails are overcrowded here.

        It’s $200 for the special MG tax. Not $18,000. I believe the manufacturing ban was lifted during the Obama years.

        • The reason machine guns cost a minimum of $18,000 is because the US government banned civilians from owning any machine guns manufactured after a certain date in 1986. No, that ban was not lifted during the Obama years — Obama was the most anti-gun president in history (until the election of Joe Biden), so why would he have lifted the ban? That ban is still in place. Converting your own gunm to full-auto is considered “manufacturing a machine gun,” so it’s double-plus illegal, because all machine guns manufactured after a certain date in 1986 are illegal for civilians to own, so not only are you manufacturing a machine gun without a license, but it’s also a post-1986-manufactured machine gun. Double-plus illegal.

          • The US military M240 machine gun is manufactured in the state of Tennessee. As of the 21st century.

            I didn’t know all the details as to how this was accomplished.

            Because the US military did have to go outside the United States to get its machine guns for a while.

  6. Does “parts that could increase the rate of fire” include Jerry Miculek’s index finger?

    • Some out there would love to cripple Jerry because he shoots too fast.

      Some out there would love to cut down tall people. Brain damage intelligent people. Destroy the families of stable people.

      The equity crew would use force to enact a Harrison Bergeron style society the instant they thought they could get away with it and if you zoom out just a bit you can see they’ve already begun through public education, participation trophies, subsidizing single parenthood, wealth redistribution and the worst one yet the trans madness.

    • The conservative judges on the Supreme Court know their personal guns are their first line of defense.

      Because they know the federal government will order their secret service detail to stand down. And not to report for duty.

  9. “…for both gun safety advocates and those concerned with protecting lawful access to firearms…” She says that like those are two different groups, or two different worldviews and values that are somehow in tension or opposition to each other.

    Those who are concerned with resisting the erosion or restoring our civil rights regarding guns are also concerned with “gun safety” – and certainly more knowledgeable about the topic than those who have misappropriated and propagandized the term to wrap it around their ignorance. Those who are knowledgeable on the topic are better able to accurately assess the efficacy of proposals to achieve actual gun safety. They recognize that prohibition and abstinence are not viable strategies.

    So those whom Her Honor describes as “those concerned with protecting lawful access to firearms” are the only true “gun safety advocates” involved in the conversation.

  10. Let’s just make 25 red states and 25 blue states…when the blue states lose all of their normal people and collapse, we send in Snake Plissken. Then we can put all the Democrats in CA and NY and wall them in…should take about a year to clean up the other 23 blue hellholes and return them to normal once the Democrats are gone.

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