My money is on this or a Hogan veto if the bill remains unchanged.
Confiscation/Ban isn't going to happen unless congress overrides the veto. I first thought he would avoid signing or vetoing anything but maybe not. I don't think Hogan will have a future in national politics if he doesn't veto and he knows it. Most likely outcome is grandfathering, future sale ban, with years of litigation.
I feel bad for the local gun shops when it all goes down.
My 2 cents is it gets shelved at gun bill day.
I am reasonably sure that the original sponsor(s) didn't realize the impact of just removing the exception. I have NO doubt they'd love to just have a ton of ARs destroyed, confiscated or removed from the state.
HOWEVER, I don't think they are prepared (yet) or intending to do that. I think if/when it gets pointed out to them (I've been trying to point it out) it will either be amended in committee to extend grandfathering to 10/1/2019 (in which case I'll acquire another couple of lowers. The few I have just don't seem enough for a life time with a ban actually at our door step) or they will shelve it entirely/not voted favorable.
If for some crazy reason it does pass, Hogan may actually lift a finger and veto it and Dems might actually fail to over ride the veto (what I have heard is it is pretty unknown among dem lawmakers and they don't really care about it).
It would be an "easy" 2A win for Hogan who can easily say he can't support it as written as it takes away the guns of tens of thousands of law abiding Maryland gun owners.
I sure don't give him any credit at all (because he doesn't deserve it) on the 2A, but if he is considering going national, he needs SOMETHING to try to burnish his image. He can try to play up signing the red flag law as "being for common sense gun laws" and also point to vetoing something like the HBAR law as "not being for taking guns from law abiding Marylanders".
Or whatever BS.