Let’s Count the Lies VA Assault Weapons Bill Author Saddam Salim Tells in Just Three Paragraphs

My bill SB749 to ban the sale of Assault Weapons will be voted on today. When I ran for the State Senate, I campaigned on this, and I promised that we would make real change in my first term. Together, we will get this to the Governor's desk. @Everytown@MomsDemand@bradybuzz pic.twitter.com/vae5FDj9tK

— Senator Saddam Azlan Salim (@salimforva) March 9, 2026

The author of the current 2026 Virginia assault weapons ban is Saddam Salim, and he published an article in the Falls Church News-Press explaining why he wrote it. The letter is full of lies. Let’s first go through all of the lies that Salim is using, and then we’ll show how they’ll be used to profile black people in Norfolk, Richmond, and the DC suburbs.

Lies

How many lies can Salim fit into three paragraphs about gun policy? Let’s find out.

Lie 1

At the top of my agenda this year is my assault weapons bill, SB 749, which would stop the sale, manufacture, and new transfer of the kinds of high-capacity firearms that turn everyday disputes into mass-casualty events.

AR-15s are responsible for fewer deaths than fatal riding lawnmower accidents nationwide, despite being owned by more people than the entire Asian American population, so everyday disputes are not being turned into mass-casualty events. Lie one.

Lie 2 and 3

I wrote this bill very deliberately so that we are not criminalizing current lawful owners. Instead, we draw a line going forward, so that over time, the most lethal weapons gradually become less common in our communities.

The bill makes it illegal to buy an AR-15, illegal to trade an AR-15, and illegal to sell an AR-15 except to a gun dealer. You cannot sell it out of state and cannot sell it legally in state.You can own it if you owned it before, and you can inherit it, and there’s no tracking for that, which means that every AR-15 transaction in the state after the bill passes will be peer-to-peer with no background check. With one stroke of a pen, Saddam Salim funneled every single AR-15 owner directly into the “gun show loophole.” His claim that he’s not criminalizing gun owners is lie two.

And because all transfers will be checkless the number of these weapons which are transferred to criminals will go up not down. They will become more common in the hands of criminals in Virginia communities. By increasing the relative concentration of these weapons into the hands of criminals, they become more common in communities where it matters, which is lie three.

Lie 4 and 5

In a commonwealth that has lived through Virginia Tech, Virginia Beach, and too many smaller tragedies to count, this is not an abstract debate for me, it is about whether we are willing to accept another decade of preventable grief.

Both of those shootings used ordinary pistols with standard magazines, not AR-15s, so the law he wants to pass would not have prevented either of those shootings. Inferring that his law applies to anything related to those tragedies is lie four.

Even if they were done with AR-15s, the fact that we know both of these were done with pistols means that ones in the future could also be done with pistols. Implying that his law prevents spree shooting grief is lie five.

Lie 6

SB 749 is my answer to the gun violence epidemic

There is no gun violence epidemic. It is a complete fabrication. 2025 had the lowest homicide record in the entire history of the United States of America, and Virginia was no different. Lie six.

Six lies and no truths in three paragraphs. There’s nothing gun related in the linked statement by Salim that isn’t a lie. He’s a liar, and the state of Virginia passed a law based on lies.

— BJ Campbell in Saddam Salim is a Liar and a Racist