Colorado state Sen. Tom Sullivan believes a new law may be the way to stop the proliferation of “assault weapons” nationwide.
Rather than banning specific guns, the law lists the characteristics of certain firearms and requires that those firearms must now have a fixed, permanent magazine that holds no more than 15 rounds.
Under the new law, popular AR- and AK-style rifles, as well as other semiautomatic centerfire rifles, pistols, and shotguns with detachable magazines, would be prohibited with some exemptions for educational institutions, gunsmiths, law enforcement, and military units.
In addition, the law imposes a process for purchasing the specified guns that involves firearms training, background checks, and the payment of a fee. According to Sullivan, who along with fellow Democrats Sen. Julie Gonzales, Rep. Andrew Boesenecker, and Rep. Meg Froelich, sponsored the new law, the permit-to-purchase provision keeps the law from being a ban.
“I’ve been on record for several years and made it very clear that I do not support an ‘assault weapons’ ban,” Sullivan told The Epoch Times. “You can still have all the features the present AR has, except the magazine will be attached.”
Second Amendment advocates, meanwhile, oppose the new law, including Ray Elliot, president of the Colorado State Shooting Association, who says members of his group “are resolute in our response” to the new law.
“Our legal team is preparing to contest Senate Bill 3, and we are committed to pursuing justice through every available avenue,” Elliot told The Epoch Times via email.
California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, Virginia, Washington, and the District of Columbia have all banned so-called assault weapons. These states ban semiautomatic rifles, shotguns, and pistols with specific characteristics such as pistol grips, threaded barrels, flash suppressors, and bayonet lugs, among others.
According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, some gun manufacturers have produced rifles that use the same action as the banned guns, but don’t have the prohibited features. For example, a rifle may use the same internal parts as an AR-15, but without a pistol grip, hand guards, flash suppressor, or other prohibited features.
Laws in Colorado and New Jersey regulate certain firearms while providing a pathway to legally purchase them.
“The Colorado House Republican Caucus stands in unified opposition to this infringement on the Second Amendment rights of Colorado citizens and will continue to advocate fiercely against such violations,” the letter reads.
“The Second Amendment is a right, and to put a paywall in front of that right is egregious and it’s wrong,” Winter said.
“This law is not a ban, and I have been clear that I oppose banning types of firearms,” Polis stated. He said the new law preserves the Second Amendment while promoting public safety.
Polis said his objective is to make Colorado “one of the top 10 safest states in the country.”
Prohibited firearms owned before the law is enacted on Aug. 1, 2026 will be grandfathered in.
“It only applies to the next [gun] purchase,” Sullivan said.
Sullivan said the effective date—more than a year away—provides gun manufacturers the time to retool and produce guns that comply with the law. It also allows state employees to set up permitting and record-keeping processes necessary to implement the law.
Chris Stone, director of state affairs for Gun Owners of America, called the law a “full-on semi-auto ban.”
“GOA obviously opposes this legislation,” he told The Epoch Times. He pointed out that the legal challenges of bans in other states have been in the court system for several years. The challenge to Maryland’s ban was filed on Dec. 1, 2020.
Huey Laugesen, executive director of the Colorado State Shooting Association, said the record-keeping provision of the new law could be used to set up a registry of gun owners, which he says is unconstitutional.
While Sullivan points out that guns are not registered under the law, Laugesen said the training records could identify gun owners.
“Anyone going through this process is going through it to purchase these types of firearms,” Laugesen told The Epoch Times.
He said gun control advocates in the state assembly introduced the bill after other bills to ban certain firearms failed in 2023 and 2024.
Sullivan maintains the only purpose of the new law is to close a loophole in the 2013 law and facilitate its enforcement on magazines that hold more than 15 rounds. He said that despite the ban, large capacity magazines that hold up to 100 rounds are still available illegally and could also be purchased from neighboring states that do not have a similar ban.
“Law enforcement has clearly had a reluctance to [enforce the magazine ban], unless [the magazines] were used in a crime,” Sullivan said. “So, we had to do something about the firearm.”
He said that requiring guns to have a permanent magazine solves the problem.
In the Bruen case, the court ruled that a gun law’s proponents must show that the law fits a plain reading of the Second Amendment and corresponds to an analogous statute from the time the Second Amendment was ratified.
“This bill takes a Constitutionally protected right and sets it up as a privilege you have to purchase from the government,” Laugesen said.
Sullivan is not concerned with the impending legal challenges and expressed confidence that if challenged, Colorado’s law will be upheld. He said other states, including Illinois, have similar restrictions and permitting requirements.
