Full Frontal Segment Begs NJ Democrat to…Repeal Gun Legislation?

This week’s Full Frontal had a bit of a twist–a plea to repeal a specific bit of gun legislation.

Full Frontal’s Allana Harkin went to New Jersey to find out more about guns and gun control–more specifically, about a new smart gun.

Check out the entire clip below:

Harkin interviews Kai Kloepfer, the 19-year-old inventor (!!!) of the smart gun. The gun recognizes your fingerprint, which means that only a select number of people could use the firearm.

“We’re not trying to create a perfect replacement for every kind of gun on the market simultaneously,” says Kloepfer. However, he argues that these guns would mitigate the need for a lot of gun laws on the books.

But wait! There’s no smart guns being sold in the country, thanks to–you guessed it–a law banning smart guns. Representative Loretta Weinberg, the majority leader of the New Jersey House of Representatives, wrote a law mandating that as soon as any smart gun hits the market, all guns sold in New Jersey have to be smart guns. This means that multiple guns rights activists, who typically don’t take kindly to being told what to do, have threatened guns salesmen across the country into backing off from smart gun sales.

This, Harkin points out, is a great example of shooting yourself in the foot.

Harkin asks Representative Weinberg why she hasn’t repealed the law. Weinberg says that she has in fact offered to repeal the law if the NRA promises not to fight the development and sales of the smartgun. Harkin is not mollified by the answer–as she says through the medium of a talk show audience, “That! Seems! Counterproductive!”

While Harkin offers to go into the other room and call Representative Weinberg pretending to be the NRA, Representative Weinberg doesn’t take her up on the offer.

Meanwhile, Kloepfer is moving ahead with his gun sales production. He plans to have the smart gun ready to roll out in a year or so. Harkin ends the segment on an ever wryer note she’s maintained through the piece: “So you think in 2018 we’ll have a functioning economy?”

Next: Seth Meyers vs. Stephen Colbert on American Controversies

Full Frontal with Samantha Bee airs on Wednesdays.