Biden Keeps Calling for Bans on Semi-automatic Guns

Biden keeps repeating a call for banning all semi-automatic guns. He keeps calling for a ban guns that fire 9-mm or higher caliber ammunition, and given that this clearly also involves most handguns, isn’t it obvious that he wants to ban the vast majority of handguns?

“The idea (that) we still allow semiautomatic weapons to be purchased is sick, it’s just sick. It has no social redeeming value, zero, none. Not a single, solitary rationale for it,” President Biden, November 24, 2022, Nantucket, Massachusetts.

“They said a .22-caliber bullet will lodge in the lung, and we can probably get it out — may be able to get it and save the life. A 9mm bullet blows the lung out of the body. So, the idea of these high-caliber weapons is, uh, there’s simply no rational basis for it in terms of self-protection, hunting. Remember, the Constitution was never absolute. You couldn’t buy a cannon when the Second Amendment was passed. You couldn’t go out and purchase a lot of weaponry.” President Biden, Monday, May 29, 2023, Washington, D.C.

“The idea you need a weapon that can have the ability to fire 20, 30, 40, 50, 120 shots from that weapon — whether it’s a — whether it’s a 9-millimeter pistol or whether it’s a rifle — is ridiculous. I’m continuing to push to eliminate the sale of those things, but I’m not likely to get that done in the near term.” Biden said at a televised CNN townhall meeting, Wednesday, July 21, 2021.

“Why should we allow people to have military-style weapons, including pistols with 9-mm bullets and can hold 10 or more rounds?” Biden at a high-dollar private fundraiser in Seattle in 2019.

9-mm pistols are clearly semi-automatic guns. About 85% of the handguns sold in the United States are semi-automatic guns. For example, in 2018, almost 3.9 million semi-automatic handguns were manufactured in the U.S., compared to less than 700,000 revolvers. So, about 85 percent of all handguns made were semi-automatics that “can hold” magazines.

What impact would banning 9-mm and larger ammunition have on guns that Americans are allowed to own?

From 1973 to 1993, U.S. manufacturers produced (note about 80% of the handguns sold in the US were made here, so these numbers don’t include foreign-made guns)  

6.6 million .357 Magnum revolvers

6.5 million .38 Special revolvers

3.1 million 9-millimeter pistols
2.4 million .380 caliber pistols

2.2 million .44 Magnum revolvers

1.7 million .45 caliber pistols
1.2 million .32 caliber revolvers.

Total 23.7 million

Those smaller than 9 millimeter

5.4 million .22 caliber pistols
5.3 million .22 caliber revolvers

4.5 million .25 caliber pistols

Total 15.2 million

So 60.93% of these guns are 9-mm or greater caliber. Most likely, this is an underestimate of that percentage.

“Weapons of war have no place on the streets of a civil society,” VP Kamala Harris, June 15, 2023 on Twitter.