The federal assault-weapons ban reached its sunset Monday after 10 years of enforcement, prompting a stern response from Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John Kerry, D-Mass.

“George Bush made a choice today,” Kerry said in a press release. “He chose his powerful friends in the gun lobby over the police officers and the families he promised to protect. The president made the wrong choice. When I am president, we will set America in a new direction with a plan to fight crime and keep our communities safer.”

The ban became law in 1994 when President Clinton signed legislation from Congress banning the manufacture and sale of 19 kinds of semi-automatic firearms.

However, the ban contained a clause causing it to expire after 10 years, requiring Congress and the president to renew it to remain in effect. Such an effort failed to materialize.

President George W. Bush has publicly voiced support for the ban, but Kerry and others say that stance merely hid Bush’s true allegiances to the National Rifle Association.

“It reflects how the [Bush] administration is dominated by the NRA,” Charles Schudson, Wisconsin Court of Appeals judge and UW lecturer, said. “After all, this has had bipartisan support, and it’s a tragedy the ban wasn’t renewed because it’s going to cost the lives of innocent people and police officers.”

Although Congress would have to pass the renewal before coming before Bush, Schudson said Bush’s lack of action is largely at fault.

“In the past it has required leadership from the president to motivate Congress to come together without fear of reprisal from the gun industry, and this president has not lobbied Congress at all.”

The Wisconsin Anti-Violence Effort has decried the sunset of the ban, citing support for its continuation from Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett, District Attorney E. Michael McCann and 82 police chiefs throughout the state.

Madison Mayor Dave Cieslewicz is also among those displeased with the ban’s expiration. Cieslewicz’s spokesperson Melanie Conklin said the mayor would support a citywide ban, but municipalities in Wisconsin are prohibited from imposing laws more stringent than state gun-control regulations.

“The mayor is not happy to see the ban expiring,” Conklin said. “He supports the right to bear arms, but that doesn’t mean any weapon you want. Thankfully we don’t deal with those often in Madison.”

Some groups who supported the ban, however, have admitted that its effect has often failed to meet expectations.

The Violence Policy Center in Washington, D.C., released a statement noting the manufacture of assault guns has largely remained uninterrupted due to the fact only 19 specific guns were prohibited.

The ban never had much effect, because it did not take many assault guns off the market, Jim Fendry of the Wisconsin Pistol and Rifle Association said.

“There never was a ban. Guns were supposedly outlawed, but anybody could own them and shoot them; they continued to be sold at all gun shows where supply was so great that it never approached demand,” Fendry said.

Fendry noted the only guns prohibited had to contain more than two of the following: a pistol grip, butt stock, flash depressor, bayonet plug or grenade launcher.

“Nobody cared about this ban. It comes down to the fact there are a lot of good people who like guns, and a lot of good people who don’t like guns. Criminals don’t use these guns because they prefer concealable handguns. I mean, where do you hide an assault weapon?”

While apathetic to the ban’s expiration, Fendry said he is primarily concerned by efforts to establish more stringent bans in the future, which he linked to Kerry and running mate John Edwards.

“People screaming the loudest are the anti-gun people, because their last piece of legislation has died,” Fendry said. “They have never passed anything that has ever stayed on the books, and now they’re using this to create media attention so they can get money from their supporters.”

The Bush campaign did not return calls Monday.