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Confiscation has always been the real goal. How it was proposed in 1976...They have SINCE added rifles to the list.

Nelson T. ‘Pete’ Shields
Founder of Handgun Control, Inc.(Now the Brady Center)

“I’m convinced that we have to have federal legislation to build on. We’re going to have to take one step at a time, and the first step is necessarily — given the political realities — going to be very modest.

Of course, it’s true that politicians will then go home and say, ‘This is a great law. The problem is solved.’ And it’s also true that such statements will tend to defuse the gun-control issue for a time.

So then we’ll have to strengthen that law, and then again to strengthen that law, and maybe again and again. Right now, though, we’d be satisfied not with half a loaf but with a slice. Our ultimate goal — total control of handguns in the United States — is going to take time.

My estimate is from seven to ten years. The problem is to slow down the increasing number of handguns sold in this country. The second problem is to get them all registered. And the final problem is to make the possession of all handguns and all handgun ammunition — except for the military, policemen, licensed security guards, licensed sporting clubs, and licensed gun collectors — TOTALLY ILLEGAL.”

-Pete Shields, Chairman and founder, Handgun Control Inc., “A Reporter At Large: Handguns,” The New Yorker, July 26, 1976, 57-58

“Yes, I’m for an outright ban [on handguns].”

-Pete Shields, Chairman emeritus, Handgun Control, Inc., 60 Minutes interview

HCI, around 1984, made a grab for the semi-auto rifles and shotguns, and missed. Then Josh Sugarmann tuned in. This has been the mantra ever since.
“ Assault weapons’ menacing looks, coupled with the public’s confusion over fully-automatic machine guns versus semi-automatic assault weapons —anything that looks like a machine gun is assumed to be a machine gun— can only increase the chance of public support for restrictions on these weapons.”

– Josh Sugarmann