SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – Freshman congressman Eric Burlison is back home in the Ozarks settling in as a representative in the US House.

Burlison stopped by OzarksFirst today to talk about his initial weeks in Washington DC and what he called a chaotic first few days as Kevin Mccarthy was voted in as the new house speaker.

He spoke about his committee assignments for the 118th congress and what work he’s doing to help those in Southwest Missouri.

We asked how he and fellow republicans plan to accomplish their goals in a divided congress.

“The best thing is stopping bad ideas and there’s nothing worse than a bad idea, a change in law that impacts people’s lives, raises their taxes, or adds some new expense. The best thing we can do is stop a lot of the madness that’s happening, and stop all of the reckless spending. We kind of put rules in place to force our own hands to try to strike a balanced budget,” said Burlison.

Legislation being introduced by Burlison seeks to repeal the ‘National Firearms Act’ – a 1934 law that requires people to apply, register, and pay a tax for certain guns and accessories.

He said he wants to see the act abolished because it criminalizes lawful gun owners and makes certain guns too expensive for most citizens to buy.

As the US has seen its 73rd mass shootings in 48 days- OzarksFirst asked Burlison if he thinks repealing a law that was put in place to reduce crime nearly 90 years ago would endanger public safety.

“People talk about shootings and these events, but what is never talked about is that when the FBI studied the subject of firearms, they concluded that – even under the Obama administration – that, 2.5 million times a year a vulnerable person, mostly women, are able to use a firearm to stop a rape or violent assault, and sometimes murder. And I will leverage that 2.5 million times a year that someone is able to defend themselves, against sadly these events that do happen, any day,” said Burlison.