Updated at 9:20 a.m. June 28 to reflect the final tally of comments.

WASHINGTON — A regulatory agency received more than 97,000 comments on a proposed nationwide ban on bump stocks, the device used in a Las Vegas concert massacre that left 58 people dead last October.

The 90-day comment period ended at midnight Wednesday, and gun control advocates and Second Amendment advocates from Texas and across the country were eager to share their fears — of violence, or of losing their gun rights.

Southlake Carroll High School junior Alanna Miller commented that she was at a concert on the night of the Las Vegas shooting, and that her experience led her to support the ban.

"The access and availability to [sic] bump stocks enabled the shooter in Las Vegas to make his attack as deadly as it was," Miller wrote. "I couldn't help but think that it could've been MY own concert that turned deadly."

Libertarian Texas House District 10 candidate Matt Savino opposed the ban on legal grounds, noting that the trigger still functions separately each time a semiautomatic weapon is fired, even with the assistance of a bump stock.

"While bump stock devices will now be treated as machine guns under these regulations, they also raise serious questions in regard to AR-15s and other semiautomatic rifles — as they are now on the brink of being designated as machine guns by the next anti-gun administration," Savino wrote.

Bump stocks modify rifles to mimic the rapid fire of automatic machine guns, which are illegal. Most were manufactured by Slide Fire, a small company outside Abilene that ended production May 20 in anticipation of a ban.

The little-known device entered the national debate about gun violence after Stephen Paddock used them to spray fire on an outdoor country music concert in Las Vegas.

Mass shootings in Sutherland Springs and Santa Fe, Texas, did not involve bump stocks. But those tragedies increased pressure for some type of policy response.

In March, President Donald Trump called on the Justice Department to reconsider a 2010 ruling in which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives decided not to ban bump stocks because the devices were not "machine guns."

Efforts to ban the devices by law stalled in Congress.

Texas Sen. John Cornyn has sent the ATF a letter in support of the bump stock ban.

Sen. Ted Cruz has not taken a public stance.

There is no time frame set for the review process to determine if the ban will go into effect.

Many Texans submitted comments to the ATF.

Jan Orr-Harter of Aledo wrote that she is "very proud" of Cornyn for authoring a bill to tighten background check reporting, and called a bump stock ban "an excellent next step."

"Our child just graduated from high school this week. She went to school every day thinking she might be shot," Orr-Harter commented.

Others such as state Rep. Jonathan Stickland, R-Bedford, oppose the proposed ban. Stickland believes in "constitutional carry," the idea that the Second Amendment ensures the right to carry guns without a license or background check.

"The ban of any additional firearms or firearm accessories is a slippery slope that must not be allowed," Stickland wrote. "We should no longer be defending our rights, but rather be on the offensive and actively be taking our rights back."

Even if the regulation is approved, bump stock prohibitions can be hard to enforce. At least seven states enacted bans after Las Vegas, as have a number of cities.

A Stateline report found that since New Jersey's ban went into effect in mid-April, state police said they had not received a single device. The attachments cost between $180 and $425 each, and the state provided no financial incentive for owners to turn in their bump stocks.

CORRECTION, 11:30 a.m. June 28: An earlier version of this story misidentified Matt Savino as a Republican Texas House candidate. He is a Libertarian.