American refusal: A fraction of gun owners registered pistol stabilizing braces with ATF by May 31 deadline

By
Suzanne Downing
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52

Pistol owners across America have mostly ignored the May 31 deadline arbitrarily set by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) for registering their pistol-brace-equipped firearms.

The Biden Administration says there are three to seven million such pistol-brace-equipped firearms, but gun groups say the number is far higher — as high as 40 million. These devices are widely purchased and can be manufactured with 3-D printers.

The Reload, a website devoted to firearm news, says “more than 90 percent of the guns equipped with pistol braces remain unregistered despite the risk of potential federal felony charges.”

The new regulation involves devices that help stabilize guns for better accuracy. The agency has put these stabilizers into the same category as other guns, like machine guns, which it regulates and taxes under the National Firearms Act of 1934.

The ATF says it had received just over 250,000 applications for registration during the four-month grace period, after the rule was signed by Attorney General Merrick Garland on Jan. 13. Those who have not registered their stabilizers can now be charged criminally under the National Firearms Act.

During the four-month grace period, the Biden Administration waived the tax requirement for registration to give gun owners an opportunity to bring their firearms into compliance without facing any immediate penalties.

On May 31, ATF wrote on Facebook that owners of stabilizing braces must remove the short barrel and instead attach a 16-inch or longer rifled barrel to the firearm, or permanently remove and dispose of, or alter, the “stabilizing brace” such that it cannot be reattached. Alternately they can turn the firearm into the ATF or destroy the firearm.

52 COMMENTS

  1. A law ignored isn’t law. If the court doesn’t save the BATFEces then there is no reason to follow the NFA nor the GCA. Same sentence for a short barrel full auto suppressed rifle. So why not go all the way?

      • An UNJUST law ignored is called “holding the moral high ground”.

        But a radical leftist extremist conformist and kneejerk pro-establishment, bootlicking quisling like you would not understand that.

        • Why don’t you ever use your real name, Jefferson?

          I think you’re afraid to because your radical views, extreme anger, and overall disagreeable temperament wouldn’t bode well for you amongst your friends, employer, and social group.

          • Why don’t you use your name, dog? Aren’t you preaching hypocrisy?

            This crap is boring. Can’t push an argument effectively, pull a “Frank” and start whining about pseudonyms.

            There are two good reasons most of us opt for pseudonyms. Including many progressive trolls.

            1-It’s none of your business.

            2-serve ourselves up for the easy wrath of the internet mob who routinely ruin lives and reputations of people they disagree with? Hardly.

          • So, when you cannot factually refute or response to my argument, you attempt to divert the discussion to the utter irrelevancy of my identity, is that it?

            You radical leftist trolls seem to be irrationally obsessed about, and hate, the anonymity of posters here. That tells us yet more about the deep, abiding intellectual and emotional dysfunction prevalent among your kind.

            Oh, and by the way, why don’t YOU post under your real name?
            (Not that any of us here except Suzanne would know that fact even if you did, however.)

          • Where have you published YOUR name ‘dog’?

            You claim we have radical views because we oppose infringement on the U.S. Constitution? Interesting. Real Americans, maybe even to a higher degree here in red state Alaska, expect actual citizens to have extreme anger and be quite disagreeable when the foundation of our society’s legal system. You do not show any concern there. Why is that?

      • So what dog. Maybe you’re right and ignoring this law amounts to a crime. What are you going to do about it? Are you going to turn us all in to the ATF? Are you making a list, right now, of all your neighbors that have quietly stashed their arm braces, or secretly ignored other unconstitutional regs? Nothing makes you happier than saying yes sir/no sir to all the ‘right’ authorities, isn’t that right.

        Now that I think about it, wasn’t Sam Brinton in the dog training business?

        • Law and order! Law and Order! Law and Order, all the Conservatives cried! What hypocrites.

          • “I submit that someone who breaks a law that he holds to be immoral, yet yields to the penalty under that law, is in fact showing the highest regard for the rule of law” (Or something close to that)
            ~Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King.

            We’ll see
            What happens when charges are bought before we start calling people hypocrites.

            Dog, because a bureaucracy makes a rule, that does not a law make. We have a Congress that does that.

            Oh, by the way, what’s your real name?

      • Even a career LEO like myself can’t agree with you on that one.

        With enforcement comes legitimacy, without legitimacy you gain no willful compliance and with legitimacy you carry the weight of society when you accuse someone of a crime.

        Willful compliance demonstrates society’s acceptance of the legitimacy of government.

        It is unfortunate that the ATF did this administratively, they have very little of the public’s respect to lose.

        If they had been wise they would have left this to the legislative branch.

      • “A law ignored is a crime, sorry.”
        And enforcement ignored, as in the case of so many examples today, is a law not worth the paper it’s written on.
        So go get ’em, Dude.

      • What law?
        There is no law ignored here. The BATFE altered a definition in a regulation, not a law.
        If you do not understand that distinction, perhaps you should get educated.

      • ATF doesn’t make laws whidbey. Congress does.

        This rule created by the atf out of thin air will be declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

        It is not in line with NYSRPA vs. Bruen and does not follow the text and tradition set forth by other laws.

        Also, the ATF already said the braces did not make the pistol a short barreled rifle. They don’t get to flip flop whenever they feel like it.

      • Not really. The article doesn’t really explain the situation. The pistol owners likely decided to detach the brace from the pistols. All this shows is that gun owners distrust the ATF so much they would rather detach a brace than get a free stamp and register the weapon with a hostile government entity.

        • That’s what I don’t get about this. The process of making new laws is not theirs, but I did get two sbr stamps out of it that I at least hope they don’t recind when this rule is shot down in court. Anyone else notice that new section that showed up directly before this rule on the atf site? I think they were preparing for if they lose to pull all the tax deferred approvals under this ‘interpretation.’

          • I as a former type 7 SOT 2 would just warn that registration leads to confiscation. The BATFEces isn’t known for ignoring low hanging fruit. It was explained to me that on average, people presented with give them up or face charges usually capitulate. They have to take a whole bunch of guns to get to the attorney fees where most people won’t just replace what’s taken.

            I know them.

            I’d prefer a gun fight to compliance.

  2. If the feds want to ban these items, they need to do it the right way and pass a law. Agencies of the executive branch can’t do this, they enforce laws Congress passes. And likely a law banning these would be found unconstitutional under the 2nd Amendment.

    This is why the ATF is seeing near-zero compliance. What they’re doing is illegal and unconstitutional.

  3. This will be challenged in court.

    The test case will not be a regular guy. Instead, ATF will wait until they find an especially nasty defendant. Child predator, terrorist, school shooter…anything to make sure the judges will be so disgusted they will rule on emotion rather than the law. No way ATF will risk the loss on appeal for a regular joe with nothing more than a pistol brace.

  4. Dirty Joe will attempt as much control as He can as does Xi. Vaccine mandates which proved illegal but so many sheep complied and the ones who refused were kicked out of important jobs and military careers. He gets his rocks off by ruling with his fist clenched and hollering at the microphone. Beware sheep more mandates ahead. Merrick and the ATF are there to back him up and make you suffer if you dont comply. 87,000 IRS agents are on their way to help you file your taxes “properly” except son Hunter Uncle Jimmy and the rest of the Clan members.

  5. Ignoring this, and most other restrictions on firearms possession, is just being quietly American. Nothing different from the days when the Brits searched American homes for weapons and agitators. The red coats were doing the kings business then and the ATF is doing slow joe’s business now. Same actions, different era.

  6. The ATF knows nothing about guns, hardly more than what Biden and most Democrats, including Alaska Democrats, know. Moreover, Democrats know nothing about the American culture of firearms that stretches back to the 17th century. Any country founded by a revolution is bound to give firearms a key role in every day society but for America the evolution of manufacturing technology, and American leadership in manufacturing, cannot be separated from ownership and use of personal firearms. It was in large part self-reliance and taking personal responsibility for self-defense that actually created Americans before America was created.

    There were perhaps one hundred tools and facets of every day life in America but banned from common use by lower classes in Britain that drafters of the constitution could have chosen to protect but only arms and defense can be found in the final document. The Bill of Rights recognizes inherent rights that cannot be taken away by any means but force. The Bill of Rights can be and is continually interpreted by the courts but no part of it can be reduced, let alone eliminated.

    Small arms could have saved millions of people from Hitler’s National Socialist German Workers’ Party, and from Stalin’s Communist Party, and did defeat the US Armed Forces in Vietnam and in Afghanistan. F4s in Vietnam and F35s in Afghanistan were not nearly sufficient to bring victory to the US over small arms.

    Firearms save citizens from governments again and again. Right here in Alaska, in 2023, we saw the two sides square off over House Speaker Cathy Tilton’s HB 61, and that bill was enacted to protect Alaskans and their firearms ownership during times when the government declares an emergency.

    • Yeah. The whole justification of the Chevron doctrine is that administrative state is better qualified to regulate and make rules than Congress is, since they are focused on those issues. But every time we get these ATF officials to testify about their new rules about guns, they say “Well, I can’t answer that. I’m not really an experts on guns. It’s never been my forte.”

      I can’t wait for Chevron to be overturned.

  7. Interim immunity: Just make a donation (minimum $15) and become a member of the SAF; all members are exempt from complying with this re-interpretation of what has been legally defined as a pistol for about the past decade or so by the BATF. As a plaintiff in one of the lawsuits, the SAF (amongst other plaintiffs) and their members do not have to meet this new BATF requirement while the lawsuit works its way through the courts. SAF.org

    • Currently that stay would only apply to those in the fifth district states. The court making that ruling doesn’t have the authority elsewhere. Others I’m sure are to follow though, and $15 is a small price to pay to find their critical legal work.

  8. Gov’ says 3-7 million. Gun groups say about 40 million. So 250,000 of some number between 3 and 40 million requested an application. With that span in the data set, it seems to me that ATF has no idea what’s going on.

    Of those 250,000 applications how many were returned? I’ll bet ATF doesn’t even know.

  9. Lol, W-Dog is more then likely just one of these rent a cop type or security guards who dreams of being a door knocking Gestapo lol, all I got to say is, Thanks to Obama and now the Biden tenures, I’d say Good luck registering, finding, making sense of any of the circumvented laws and non laws now days, the cats been out of the bag for at least 15 years now, gun ownership has at least tripled.. We’re living in very very dangerous times right now, but it’ll be interesting to see who ignites the powder keg that’s inevitable to go off. I’m guessing the Feds should be smart enough to not create chaos, but who knows with these loons in this present Democratic
    administration , they may be looking for chaos just in order to flood their News zones with more props and drama. what a total mess they have now, seriously what a Mess they have created!! Yip we have Some sick sick people running things right now!

      • You just compared 2nd Amendment supporters to salve owning, plantation owners. That’s a new low Greg.

        Possessing a firearm is codified in the U.S. Constitution as a RIGHT extended to all citizens not specifically prohibited by previous legal actions (no felons or crazy people). So please explain to all of us what makes me, as a gun owner, similar to someone that once owned slaves? If anything, the Constitution reads that a human should never be a slave as Constitutional rights are extended to all men. That same Constitution also reads as giving the human, owned as a slave, the right to ‘keep and bear arms’ for his/her own protection.

        Go ahead, call us ‘plantation owners’ again.

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