California Senator Leland Yee , who was later convicted of arms trafficking , attempted to have the bullet button outlawed in California , as did U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein at the federal level ; both attempts failed . On April 20 , 2016 , California state lawmakers gave initial approval of a bill that prohibited the sale of rifles with the bullet button . This was in response to a December 2015 terrorist attack in San Bernardino , California , despite the fact that the perpetrators , Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik , used rifles that had their bullet buttons illegally removed . In July , the legislation was signed by the governor , and sales of bullet button-equipped rifles in late 2016 were reported by '' The Los Angeles Times '' to have doubled in anticipation of a January 1 , 2017 ban on sales of new such rifles
a December 2015 terrorist attack
2015 San Bernardino attack
Bullet button