(The Center Square) – Colorado Democrats introduced their latest iteration of legislation to ban the sale of so-called assault weapons on the first day of the 2025 legislative session.
Senate Bill 25-003 defines a semiautomatic firearm as any semiautomatic rifle, shotgun, or gas-operated handgun that takes a detachable magazine. The legislation would make the manufacturing, purchase or sale of specified semiautomatic firearms in the state a class 2 misdemeanor, with subsequent offenses being a class 6 felony.
Senate Democrats said in a news release the legislation is needed “to fully implement and enforce Colorado’s existing high-capacity magazine prohibition.” In 2013, Colorado passed a ban on high-capacity magazines, which it defined as holding over 15 rounds.
SB 25-003 excludes “a firearm that has a permanently fixed magazine that cannot accept more that 15 rounds of ammunition.”
Last session, an assault weapons ban failed to advance in the Senate after passage in the House. That bill listed dozens of makes and models it would ban. A similar bill also failed in the House during the 2023 session.
Rocky Mountain Gun Owners, the top pro-gun lobby group in the state, promised to oppose the latest assault weapon legislation.
“It is by far and away the most extreme version we have seen of this yet,” the groups said in a tweet. “It will ban ALL semiautomatic rifles, pistols and shotguns that accept detachable magazines!”
SB 25-003, sponsored by Democrats Sen. Julie Gonzales, Sen. Tom Sullivan, Rep. Meg Froelich and Rep. Andrew Boesenecker, was assigned to the Senate State, Veterans, & Military Affairs Committee.