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SALEM, Ore. (AP) — A bill prohibiting domestic abusers and people under restraining orders from owning firearms became America’s first new gun control law since the Feb. 14 Florida high school massacre.
“Well done Oregon,” Democratic Gov. Kate Brown exclaimed Monday after signing the law on the steps of the state Capitol as some 200 people, including victims of domestic abuse and high school students, applauded and cheered.
The shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 people has created a wave of young anti-gun activists that has now reached cross-country into Oregon. Students from a high school in the Portland suburb of Lake Oswego traveled 40 miles (65 kilometers) to stage a gun-control rally in the state capital, Salem, Monday morning.
The bill that Brown signed Monday closes a loophole in a 2015 law that excluded some abusers from the ban on buying or owning guns and ammunition, such as people who they don’t live with the partner they’re abusing or threatening, and those under restraining orders.
The measure was introduced before the Feb. 14, Florida shooting, but Brown emphasized the bloodshed as she lobbied the Oregon Legislature for passage and signed the bill.
