President Biden on Monday kicked off the federal government's newest campaign against currently legal gun ownership in a prop-assisted Rose Garden event.
Highlighting the pending new ATF "Frame or Receiver" Final Rule, in which Biden compared couches to 80-percent lowers before saying the latter would now require a serial number and background check. He also tripled down on oft-rebuked past claims that you "could not buy a cannon" during the time of the Founding Fathers, grossly misrepresented the recent settlement with the insurance companies representing the former Remington Outdoors, and repeatedly referred to the ATF as the "AFT" despite delivering prepared statements.
The president also said, "certain people from the very beginning weren’t allowed to purchase guns," another oft-repeated Biden statement that has been debunked by fact-checkers, who point to the only potential "certain people" referenced as being slaves who were barred from owning guns by state laws, not the Second Amendment.
Biden was joined at the White House event by anti-gun advocates and big-name fellow Democrats but his announcements were quickly echoed and applauded by Blue State governors and attorneys general not in attendance, including those of California, Connecticut, New York, and Pennsylvania.
"California will not stand idly by as gun manufacturers, traffickers and others spread death and carnage on our streets," said Gov. Gavin Newsom in one bellicose announcement. "We will continue to lead efforts to save lives and work to ensure policies originating in California become a model for other states and the nation."
Similarly, Democrats on Capitol Hill that have backed "assault weapon" bans on commonly-owned popular semi-auto firearms issued companion statements pushing the need to back up Biden's "ghost gun" ban with law. California's U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein said she hoped "Congress will follow suit and pass similar legislation to end the epidemic of gun violence," while U.S. Rep. David Cicilline of Rhode Island took the opportunity to push his "Untraceable Firearms Act," which aims to "prohibit unlicensed private individuals from owning machines that have a primary purpose of manufacturing firearms."
Besides the restrictions on self-manufactured guns, the new rule, according to the White House, "ensures that firearms with split receivers are subject to regulations requiring serial numbers and background checks when purchased from a licensed dealer, manufacturer or importer," a potential legal issue for tens of millions of law-abiding gun owners with AR-15/AR-10 style rifles and pistols.
Industry reaction
In response to Biden's newest push, going hard on legal privately made firearms and the Second Amendment rather than cracking down on criminals, the gun industry and 2A groups fired back.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation
NSSF is also closely monitoring the submission of the Final Rule by the Department of Justice (DOJ) to redefine frames and receivers, which would significantly alter the sale and possession of not only personally-made firearms (PFMs) but numerous other types and models as well. NSSF will review the Final Rule carefully to see if DOJ listened and took into consideration the industry’s comments that were submitted. As proposed, this rule radically alters the manufacturing and compliance processes for manufacturers of traditional firearms, not just the making of incomplete, unfinished parts Congress has not chosen to regulate.
The Firearms Policy Coalition
Biden’s proposed rule to eliminate so-called “ghost guns” would create an entirely new class of highly regulated items by redefining the term “firearm” to include a host of parts, and collections of parts ATF now considers “readily” convertible into functional firearms. This move calls into question the legality of an unknowable number of parts and kits purchased by peaceable people for decades.
The rule, which raises serious concerns about executive overreach and separation of powers, is yet another assault by the Biden administration on the rights and liberties of everyday gun owners. FPC condemns in the strongest terms this attack on the American tradition of home gunmaking and any effort to disarm or criminalize peaceable people.
Far from “clarifying” anything, the rulemaking tortures simple terms from law into multi-part definitions, with newly injected sub-terms like “readily” having their own lengthy definitions. This is clearly an attempt to sidestep Congress, as Biden even indicated in his remarks today.
U.S. Concealed Carry Association:
Nothing that the President is proposing today will make Americans safer in the face of skyrocketing crime because criminals by definition do not abide by the law. It’s disappointing that the President is doubling down on ineffective policies instead of supporting law-abiding Americans who simply want to protect themselves and their families.
Meanwhile, Alan Gottlieb, chair of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, made the argument that Biden's repeated tales of cannon prohibitions are telling.
"Now is a good time for Americans to wonder what else about gun rights Joe Biden has been lying about," said Gottlieb. "This isn’t just an idle error, it’s an obsession with him. He has been trying to misrepresent and even discredit the Second Amendment’s protection of the right of individual citizens to keep and bear arms for decades, even when he’s caught and called out for it. No honest person does that.
"It’s time for Joe Biden to stop lying about the Second Amendment," he concluded.
