Feinstein Set to Push for Weapons Ban : Congress: As the crime bill comes up for discussion, the senator will seek votes to restrict 13 types of assault weapons.

WASHINGTON — Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said Monday she hopes to play a leading role in getting Senate approval for a ban on assault weapons.

“Everybody believes these weapons are egregious. They don’t belong on the streets,” Feinstein told a breakfast meeting of editors and reporters in the Times Washington Bureau. “They are brutal, terrible weapons of war and they shouldn’t be floating through a civilian society where they fall into the hands of kids, gangs, people who are mentally incompetent, and become the weapon of revenge for anybody that’s got a grudge.”

Feinstein, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, recently began focusing on domestic violence issues and expects to play a central role in shaping the crime bill, which is expected to come up for committee discussion this week.

A proponent of handgun control, Feinstein said she has been startled by the amount of influence exerted by the National Rifle Assn. in its thus-far successful campaign to prevent Congress from passing any restrictions on the availability of assault weapons.

Feinstein called the National Rifle Assn. “a very real power” to be reckoned with. “A thing that’s really surprised me in the Senate is the grip that the NRA has,” she said.

“The National Rifle Assn. and others who believe that the 2nd Amendment provides the right to individually bear arms--although that’s never been proven in court--apparently do such a job with their members and the mail and in campaigns that I think there is a consequential level of fear that prevents any other consideration.”

Feinstein said Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Judiciary Committee, has put her in charge of lining up Senate votes for a ban on assault weapons. She considers the legislation a modest first step, but said gun control advocates need a few such victories before taking on more sweeping measures.

“The belief is that the best chance to win something is with assault weapons,” Feinstein said.

Feinstein said she recognizes that getting enough votes, particularly from Southern Democrats, will not be easy. She is combining parts of legislation offered previously by Sens. Dennis DeConcini (D-Ariz.) and Howard M. Metzenbaum (D-Ohio) to produce a bill that would ban the sale, manufacture and possession of 13 kinds of assault weapons. Her bill also would ban ammunition clips of certain sizes.

Feinstein said she was skeptical of a proposal by the District of Columbia to deploy National Guard troops in violent neighborhoods. She said it would pose a high risk and be “precedent setting for the nation.”

While raising those concerns, Feinstein continues to support legislation offered by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) that would allow the use of National Guard troops on the California-Mexico border in an attempt to halt illegal immigration. Feinstein said that assigning the Guard to city police duties raises serious questions about deadly force, weapons policies and arrest powers and is different from Boxer’s proposal, which is to use troops largely for administrative tasks.

Although Feinstein enjoys favorable poll ratings among California voters, she acknowledged her concern about the wealth of multimillionaire Michael Huffington, the Santa Barbara Republican who announced his intention to run for her Senate seat in 1994, less than a year after being elected to the House.

Feinstein said she has two significant advantages over Huffington--she has lived her entire 60 years in California and has developed a wide base of support after running statewide races for governor in 1990 and the Senate in 1992. By contrast, Huffington is little known outside his Santa Barbara district and returned to California from Texas in 1988.

“Here’s a man that put $5 million into his own (House) campaign (last year), said he was going to do certain things, didn’t do them and turned around instead and is running for the Senate,” Feinstein said. “So we’ll have to see what this adds up to.”