NRA Aiming at AG Healey’s Assault Weapons Enforcement Notice

Maura Healey (AP Photo/Steven Senne, File)

BOSTON (AP) — The National Rifle Association is taking aim at Democratic Attorney General Maura Healey’s enforcement notice clarifying what constitutes a “copy” or “duplicate” weapon under the state’s assault weapons ban.

The NRA is urging its supporters to call Massachusetts lawmakers to support two bills challenging the Democratic attorney general’s notice sent to gun sellers and manufacturers last July.

One bill would remove the attorney general’s authority to regulate firearms and would repeal the previous regulations. A second bill would eliminate the term “copy” from the statute, eliminating the premise behind Healey’s actions.

Last month, gun rights activists aided by the NRA filed a lawsuit targeting the state’s 1998 assault weapons ban.

Massachusetts has some of the strictest guns laws in the country and the nation’s lowest gun death rate in 2015.