The Michigan Senate has passed a bill Wednesday that will establish extreme risk protection orders – also known as "red flag" laws – which will allow courts to remove guns from people believed to be a danger to others or themselves.
Senate Bill 83 will now head to Gov. Gretchen Whitmer's desk.
It passed 20-17 along party lines, and came after amendments were made to the bill in the Michigan House last week.
Additionally, the Senate reportedly passed the House's red flag bills with changes, sending that legislation back to the House for final approval.
“From families in my district and around the state, there are numerous heartbreaking stories that could have had a different ending, and numerous lives that could have been saved with Extreme Risk Protection Orders,” Sen. Mallory McMorrow (D-Royal Oak), said in a statement. She was the bill's sponsor. “Red flags laws create a preventative tool, a stopgap for loved ones, judges, and law enforcement. And while it is difficult to measure ‘events that did not happen,’ evidence shows that these extreme risk protection orders can and do reduce gun deaths, especially those by suicide.”
Last week, Whitmer signed two bills she called common-sense measures – mandating background checks and registrations for all firearms purchased in the state and requiring gun owners to keep firearms and ammo locked up whenever minors are around.
"Right now only pistols require a background check but long guns and shotguns do not. That doesn't make any sense," Whitmer said last week.
What's in the bill?
Under the bill, a court can issue an extreme risk protection order "if the court determines by the preponderance of the evidence that the respondent can reasonably be expected within the near future to intentionally or unintentionally seriously physically injured himself, herself, or another individual by possessing a firearm, and has engaged in an act or acts or made significant threats that are substantially supportive of this expectation."
The courts can also consider several other factors including a history of violence, mental illness, criminal history, use of drugs or alcohol and more.
The bill said that the person who is under the order will have two chances during the year to show they are not a threat and potentially get their weapons back.
