The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives denies violating a court docket order vacating the arguable pistol brace rule followed in 2023.
The senior vp of Gun Homeowners of The us is accusing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) of making an attempt an end-run round court docket orders blocking off enforcement of its personal 2023 rule regulating pistol stabilizing braces.
The ATF denies violating any court docket orders, pronouncing it’s imposing the prevailing prohibition on short-barreled rifles (SBRs).
The brace is a tool invented in 2012 to lend a hand disabled shooters with aiming large-format pistols in line with rifle frames, such because the AR-15. It connects the rear of the pistol and the shooter’s forearm to secure their intention.
In April 2020, the ATF presented a law of the units. The rule of thumb used to be followed on Jan. 31, 2023, as a result of braces had been getting used to transform prison pistols into unlawful SBRs, consistent with the ATF.
In December 2024, an unidentified GOA member emailed the ATF about attaching a brace to a just lately bought pistol.
“On the other hand, I’ve encountered conflicting data relating to whether or not this variation will require the firearm to be registered as an SBR. May just you please supply rationalization at the acceptable rules?” the GOA member requested within the e-mail.
The ATF’s Dec. 12, 2024, reaction raised eyebrows.
An e-mail from the ATF’s Firearms Trade Systems Department (FIPB) said the June 13, 2024, choice to vacate the pistol brace rule. The company denied violating that order, declaring that it used to be imposing a pre-existing federal legislation in opposition to short-barreled rifles (SBRs).
“Federal legislation calls for a pistol with an connected stabilizing brace or inventory be registered as a short-barreled rifle (SBR),” the FIPB e-mail mentioned.
“The District Court docket’s order does now not restrict enforcement of the Nationwide Firearms Act (NFA) or Gun Keep watch over Act (GCA).
“ATF stays liable for enforcement of statutory provisions bearing on a rifle having a barrel or barrels of not up to 16 inches in period underneath the NFA and ‘short-barreled rifles’ underneath the GCA.’”
Below the NFA, ownership of SBRs can lead to fines of as much as $10,000 and 10 years in jail.
Luis Valdez, GOA’s Florida director, mentioned the ATF is attempting to bypass the court docket by way of reinterpreting the NFA and GCA.
“They’re claiming that the facility to shoulder a handgun makes it a short-barreled rifle,” Valdez advised The Epoch Instances.
GOA Senior Vice President Erich Pratt despatched a letter to Megan Bennett, assistant director of the ATF’s Place of business of Enforcement Systems and Products and services, on Jan. 9, 2025.
Within the letter, Pratt took factor with the ATF’s claims.
A pistol stabilizing brace in an undated photograph. Michael Clements/The Epoch Instances
“FIPB recommended this GOA member that if a pistol is supplied with a stabilizing brace, then it’s an SBR as a express topic—without reference to more than one courts’ orders that ATF now not implement that reasoning, or even regardless of the rule of thumb’s factorial check and ATF’s assurance that handiest ‘sure guns supplied with ‘stabilizing braces’ could be SBRs underneath that check,” Pratt wrote.
Based on an e-mail looking for remark, William Ryan, an ATF reputable, directed The Epoch Instances to the company’s Public and Governmental Affairs Directorate.
That workplace didn’t reply by way of press time.
On Jan. 13, Valdez mentioned the ATF had now not replied to Pratt’s letter both. He mentioned the ATF’s reaction would issue into what motion GOA takes.
“If we need to pass in the course of the courts, we’ll pass in the course of the courts,” Valdez mentioned.
The rule of thumb used to be arguable from its inception.
In spite of a number of open letters from the ATF declaring that braces didn’t convert pistols into short-barreled rifles, the overall rule reversed the ones selections.
President Joe Biden referred to as for the rule of thumb in April 2020 after 10 folks at a grocery retailer in Boulder, Colorado, had been killed by way of a person the usage of a gun with a stabilizing brace.
A number of gun rights teams, companies, and people sued the ATF, ATF Director Steven Dettelbach, and Legal professional Common Merrick Garland over the rule of thumb.
The complaints had been mixed into Mock v. Garland, which ended in a initial injunction in April 2024—and sooner or later, the District Court docket choice to vacate the rule of thumb.
On Aug. 15, 2024, the federal government filed understand that it might enchantment in opposition to that call.