House Speaker Paul Ryan signaled openness Thursday to looking into bump-fire stocks, devices that allows semi-automatic weapons into firing at a rapidly increased rate, similar to an automatic firearm.
In the wake of the Las Vegas shooting, Ryan told Hugh Hewitt in an interview for his MSNBC show that “clearly that’s something we need to look into.”
Ryan said that he — like a lot of members of Congress — just learned about the accessories in recent days.
“Look, I didn’t even know what they were until this week, and I’m an avid sportsman,” the Wisconsin Republican said in a clip of the interview that aired Thursday. “So, I think we’re quickly coming up to speed with what this is. Fully automatic weapons have been banned for a long time. Apparently this allows you to take a semiautomatic and turn it into a fully automatic so clearly that’s something we need to look into.”
The Senate’s No. 2 Republican, Sen. John Cornyn, told reporters Wednesday that he was interested in having a hearing on the matter, a change of tone for a Republican conference that has been dubious about making any regulatory changes related to the Second Amendment.