Rich Neal: “The argument we somehow cannot legislate safety. Let us be clear about the purpose of this amendment that is offered by…”

“The argument we somehow cannot legislate safety. Let us be clear about the purpose of this amendment that is offered by the gentleman from Indiana (Mr. Hostettler). His objective is very simple and it is to put Smith & Wesson out of business. I represent the city where Smith & Wesson is located. They essentially are being punished for doing the right thing. This is sound public policy, not policy that was put upon them. It was negotiated after months of intense conversations back and forth. What Smith & Wesson said in this historic agreement is this, and I want everybody to listen to this, they want to change the way guns are designed, distributed and marketed. They want to add locking devices and other safety features, and they wanted to develop landmark smart gun technology. We ask ourselves in this Chamber who could be against all of that?”