OK Gunners, why do you need a semi auto weapon.

[MohRokTah]

27. Prior to the Assault Weapon Ban of 1994, the semi-automatic weapons that look...

so scary to you were rarely owned by civilians. A few collectors had them.

Overall, semi-automatic weapons were in widespread legal all use, about 40% of all weapons held by civilians were semi-automatic.

The test set forth by the SCOTUS on arms that could not be effectively banned was that any weapon in widespread legal use could not be banned, thus, as a category of weapons, semi-automatic weapons can NEVER be banned constitutionally.

So the Congress invented a new category of weapons as a sub-category of semi-automatic weapons and defined them by certain cosmetic features. They named these "Assault Weapons".

Politically, the only way to ban this new category of weapon was to sunset the ban after ten years.

When the ban sunset happened, people bought the weapons in droves out of fear the ban would be renewed. Effectively, the ban created a widespread demand for these "Assault Weapons".

Now, they are in widespread legal use, thus they can never again be banned.