Gavin Newsom Turns Texas Abortion Law Ruling on Guns

California Governor Gavin Newsom has pledged to push for a law that would empower private citizens to enforce a ban on the manufacture and sale of assault weapons in the state after the U.S. Supreme Court declined to block a Texas law that bans most abortions.

A law banning abortions once a fetal heartbeat is detected, usually at about six weeks into pregnancy, came into force in September. It makes no exceptions for rape or incest.

The law, passed by Republican lawmakers, allows private citizens to enforce the ban, empowering them to sue abortion clinics and anyone else who aids someone in getting the procedure.

The Supreme Court on Friday left the Texas law in place, but allowed abortion providers to challenge the ban. It came just over a week after the court's conservative justices signaled they would roll back abortion rights in a Mississippi case and possibly overturn the landmark Roe v. Wade decision.

In a statement on Saturday night, Newsom, a Democrat who survived a recall vote in September, said he was "outraged" that the high court was "largely endorsing Texas's scheme to insulate its law from the fundamental protections of Roe v. Wade," which established the constitutional right to terminate a pregnancy in 1973.

"But if states can now shield their laws from review by the federal courts that compare assault weapons to Swiss Army knives, then California will use that authority to protect people's lives, where Texas used it to put women in harm's way," Newsom added.

California has long banned the manufacture and sale of many assault-style weapons.

A federal court recently overturned the ban, in which the judge compared the AR-15 rifle to a Swiss Army Knife as "good for both home and battle." California's ban remained in place while the state appealed.

In his statement, Newsom said he has directed his staff to work with the state's Legislature and its attorney general to pass a law that would let private citizens sue to enforce California's ban on assault weapons.

Newsom said people who sue could win up to $10,000 per violation plus other costs and attorneys fees against "anyone who manufactures, distributes, or sells an assault weapon or ghost gun kit or parts" in California.

"If the most efficient way to keep these devastating weapons off our streets is to add the threat of private lawsuits, we should do just that," he added.

The governor's pledge brought to fruition the fears of some gun rights groups, who argued that progressive states would use Texas' abortion law to limit access to guns using a similar enforcement mechanism.

The Firearms Policy Coalition, a nonprofit that advocates for gun rights, filed a brief with the Supreme Court in October opposing the Texas law for that reason.

"If Texas succeeds in its gambit here, New York, California, New Jersey, and others will not be far behind in adopting equally aggressive gambits to not merely chill but to freeze the right to keep and bear arms," Erik Jaffe, an attorney representing the FPC, wrote.

In a statement responding to Newsom's pledge, the FPC said it "will not only fight Newsom's war on human rights head-on, we will also actively undermine it through cultural change and empowerment until his authoritarian policies are as irrelevant and impotent as Newsom himself."

Newsom's office has been contacted for additional comment.