A Federal Judge ruled that Biden’s Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) had overstepped its authority after the ATF sought to regulate unfinished gun parts as part of its ability to regulate arms sales.
According to the Epoch Times, the Judge’s ruling states that the ATF exceeded its authority. Texas Judge Reed O’Connor ruled that parts are not guns and that the ATF’s attempt to regulate them was a violation of federal law,
“This case presents the question of whether the federal government may lawfully regulate partially manufactured firearm components, related firearm products, and other tools and materials in keeping with the Gun Control Act of 1968,” wrote O’Connor in his order (pdf). “Because the Court concludes that the government cannot regulate those items without violating federal law, the Court holds that the government’s recently enacted final rule … is unlawful agency action taken in excess of the ATF’s statutory jurisdiction. On this basis, the Court vacates the final rule.”
Judge O’Connor’s order notes that the ATF is attempting to regulate a gun component as a “receiver or frame.” Yet the agency previously determined that the part in question is neither a frame nor a receiver. To address the issue, O’Connor called out the incongruity of the ATF’s ruling, saying it is a logical contradiction,
“Logic dictates that a part cannot be both; not yet a receiver and receiver at the same time. Defendant’s reliance on that logical contradiction is fatal to their argument.”
The case against the ATF was brought by a pro-Second Amendment group, the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC). They cheered Judge O’Connor’s ruling. In a statement, Cody J. Wisniewski of the FPC said,
“We’re thrilled to see the Court agree that ATF’s Frame or Receiver Rule exceeds the agency’s congressionally limited authority. With this decision, the Court has properly struck down ATF’s Rule and ensured that it cannot enforce that which it never had the authority to publish in the first place.”
The FPC also tweeted about the ruling, calling it a “monumental victory against the tyrannical ATF.” The FPC accused the ATF of unlawfully attacking gun owners and vowed to continue fighting, saying they “will continue to bring these cases to put a stop to the immoral and unconstitutional actions of the disarmament regime.”
🔥🔥🔥
Destroying the ATF’s “Frame or Receiver” Final Rule with our VanDerStok v Garland Lawsuit gets us one step closer to a world of maximal human liberty.
Get on the winning team at https://t.co/6Pp2ekN6th. pic.twitter.com/9RQomybs3x
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) July 2, 2023