With the Biden Administration’s arbitrary 90-day ban on new firearms export license approvals set to expire, lawmakers are moving to "crack down on the unnecessary export" of American guns.
U.S. Rep. Norma J. Torres (D-CA-35) and Joaquin Castro (D-TX-20), along with U.S. Sens. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) and Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), penned a five-page letter to Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo, whose department currently oversees firearm exports, to set sweeping restrictions on the practice.
This would include shifting oversight back to the State Department (it was shifted to Commerce during the Trump Administration) and in the meantime institute a list of 11 steps including ending Commerce’s involvement in the SHOT Show, cutting the length of an export license down from four years to one, encourage overseas law enforcement to use the ATF's eTrace system to track recovered guns, and capping both the number of guns and exports "to civilian buyers."
The move comes as the temporary ban on new export licenses established by Commerce last October is set to expire.
The lawmakers cited the increase in overseas exports as a reason to clamp down on the industry.
"Commerce’s decision to initiate the pause and review process was welcome, but sorely needed… new data show that from March 9, 2020 (the date of the Trump administration’s transfer) to June 30, 2023, Commerce approved nearly 25,000 firearms export licenses with a total value of $34.7 billion, or roughly $10.5 billion per year. This represents a more than $1 billion increase in the annual value of license approvals as compared to the time period when the State Department controlled these approvals,” said the lawmakers.
The National Shooting Sports Foundation, the trade group for the U.S. firearms industry, told Guns.com that the effort to upend legally sending American-made guns overseas will ultimately cost jobs.
"These anti-gun lawmakers are willingly ignorant to the current export rules for firearms," said Mark Oliva, NSSF's public affairs director. "Firearm exports have end-to-end user checks that are subject to review by Commerce, State, and the Defense Department. These lawmakers let the mask slip when they admit the ultimate goal is to reverse the reforms that were initiated by the Obama administration and would choose to return to an era of onerous fees and waiting periods with the ability of Congress to interfere with exports by reviewing any export license valued over $1 million. These lawmakers aren’t just anti-gun, they are anti-business. Their demands would risk American jobs because it would make American firearm manufacturers less competitive to foreign manufacturers due to artificial interference."
Banner image: American-made Marlin and Ruger rifles at SHOT Show 2024 in Las Vegas. Such guns could see an artificial barrier to export moving forward if Dems on Capitol Hill get their way. (Photo: Chris Eger/Guns.com)
