'Thought it was a joke': Bullets now for sale in vending machines in 3 GOP-led states

A Texas-based company has developed vending machines that sell bullets and installed them at a handful of grocery stores in Texas, Oklahoma, and Alabama, with plans for expansion into other states, according to news reports this week. The vending machines are "likely to stoke controversy," Newsweek reported, while Gizmodo called their spread a "questionable new trend." Social media users wrote that the idea of vending machines for bullets was "insane", "horrible," and "beyond sick." Though Walmart, a major ammunition retailer, has put some restrictions on sales in the last ten years, thanks to public pressure that followed mass shootings, bullets remain widely available in the U.S. "In most of the country it's harder to buy Sudafed than it is to buy ammunition," according toThe Trace, which characterized federal law on ammunition sales as "next to nonexistent." "I got some calls about ammunition being sold in grocery stores, vending machines," Tuscaloosa Councilor Kip Tyner said during a city council meeting on July 2, according toABC 33/40.