House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) and Rep. Mike Thompson (D-CA) introduced legislation to criminalize private gun sales on Tuesday.

As promised, gun control proponent Gabby Giffords was there to take part in the introduction of the legislation, which is titled H.R. 8.

The “8” is intended to honor Giffords for surviving the attack on her life eight years ago, on January 8, 2011.

It is truly blessing to have former Rep. @GabbyGiffords join us to introduce #HR8, the Bipartisan Background Checks Act of 2019, eight years after the Tucson shooting. https://t.co/ePopfptJV9 — Nancy Pelosi (@SpeakerPelosi) January 8, 2019

Rep. Thompson tweeted an ABC News report explaining H.R. 8, which criminalizes private gun sales by expanding background checks to cover non-retail gun sales.

The Democrats are joined by three House Republicans: Rep. Peter King (R-NY), Rep. Brian Mast (R-FL), and Rep. Chris Smith (R-NJ).

Ironically, although the bill was ubiquitously intended to honor Giffords, the laws contained in it would not have prevented the attack on her from occurring. Her attacker passed a background check at retail to acquire the handgun he used in that heinous crime.

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange