The Senate rejected a gun rights amendment to a water resources bill on Wednesday that called for allowing firearms in national outdoor recreational areas.
The amendment introduced by GOP Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma was defeated 56-43, just four votes short of the 60 needed to defeat a Democratic-led filibuster against it, Politico reported. Illinois Sen. Mark Kirk was the only Republican to vote no on the amendment, while a dozen Democrats crossed the aisle to vote with Republicans in favor of the measure.
California Sen. Barbara Boxer, the water bill's sponsor and chairwoman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, stressed that the focus of the bill was on water projects and jobs for the Army Corps of Engineers and not about carrying firearms in the national spaces it manages.
"This is a public works bill dealing with water infrastructure," she said on the Senate floor,
according to Politico. "It is not a bill about guns."
Coburn withdrew a second amendment that would have required the government to create a registry of all the guns and ammunition it owns.
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