LAKEWOOD, Colo. — Colorado Attorney General Phil Weiser said on Friday that he was "deeply frustrated" by the U.S. Supreme Court's decision to overturn a federal bump stock ban and called for lawmakers to pass a statewide ban.
The U.S. Supreme Court ruled on Friday that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives did not have authority to issue the regulation that banned bump stocks. The justices said a bump stock is not an illegal machine gun because it doesn’t make the weapon fire more than one shot with a single pull of the trigger.
“This decision directly will harm people by allowing a dangerous mechanism, a bump stock, to be used in a way that creates an automatic weapon," Weiser said. "This court needs to be more attuned to the consequences of its decisions, and I’m deeply frustrated by today’s decision."
He said the high court's decision will make the United States' gun violence problem worse.
“The Supreme Court absolutely got this decision wrong," he said. "The statute is clear: The agency’s decision is sensible, and by overruling it, this is going to endanger people."
RELATED: Supreme Court strikes down Trump-era ban on bump stocks, gun accessories used in 2017 massacre
Bump stocks are accessories that replace a rifle's stock, the part that gets pressed against the shooter's shoulder. When a person fires a semiautomatic weapon fitted with a bump stock, it uses the gun's recoil energy to rapidly and repeatedly bump the trigger against the shooter's finger.
The gun accessory was used in the deadliest shooting in modern American history — a Las Vegas massacre that killed 60 people and injured hundreds more.
Colorado never had its own law banning bump stocks. The federal ban went into effect in 2018, and it came after the 2017 Las Vegas shooting. Now, without a federal ban, Weiser said Colorado state lawmakers should pass one.
"We, in Colorado, should ban bump stocks," he said. "They are dangerous."
Former Aurora Police Chief Dan Oates also criticized the ruling.
“I don’t think as a practical matter there is any distinction between a machine gun and an assault rifle with a bump stock attached to it that operates exactly the same as a machine gun," he said.
Oates recently joined a new lobbying group, Police Leaders for Community Safety, which aims to get Congress to reform the country's gun laws.
“The whole purpose of our new organization is to look for reasonable, sort of, nonpartisan solutions to gun violence in America," Oates said. "So, this one sort of smacks us in the face."
9NEWS also spoke with a gun shop owner who does not personally own bump stocks and who won't sell them but said believes the court's decision was correct.
"I don't like the ATF making rulings," said Wayne Price, owner of The Gun Room. "They don't make the law. They're here to enforce the law."
He said most of his business comes from people buying older collectible guns.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
SUGGESTED VIDEOS: Politics