When the National Shooting Sports Foundation's senior vice president and general counsel Larry Keane recently joined me on Bearing Arms Cam & Co to talk about the city of Chicago's new lawsuit against Glock, he called on Congress to investigate a conspiracy between the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, Everytown (whose former chief federal lobbyist is now in charge of the White House office), and Chicago officials. 

If Congress does decide to start digging into the circumstances of the lawsuit, it's going to need plenty of shovels, because more anti-2A politicians are now involving themselves in the litigation. 

Twelve states and Washington, D.C., have sent a letter to gun maker Glock, asking the company to preserve documents about its line of pistols and their ability to be converted into machine guns as the states investigate whether the sale of the guns violates their laws.

The letter, authored by New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin and signed by the attorneys general from Colorado, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and several other states, comes a week after the city of Chicago sued Glock, claiming it has known for years that the addition of a small, cheap part called an auto sear can turn its handguns into illegal machine guns that can fire up to 1,200 rounds per minute.

Chicago's lawsuit said the company has increased production and sales but has never made changes to its pistol design to prevent its conversion.

Citing Chicago's allegations, the letter said the company makes and sells deadly weapons "in reckless disregard for public safety."

The letter was sent to Carlos Guevara, general counsel for Smyrna, Georgia-based Glock. Guevara did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

If the allegations in Chicago’s lawsuit are true, the attorneys general said the company could be in violation of their state laws and could face enforcement action. While the states investigate, they directed Glock to preserve documents dating back to 1987 covering the company’s knowledge of the conversion of its pistols into machine guns and the laws governing these “Glock switches,” financial records and marketing materials for the pistols.

I'm surprised that California Attorney General Rob Bonta's name isn't on the demand letter, but 2A advocates will recognize many of the Rogues Gallery of anti-gun AGs who did put pen to paper, like Washington AG Bob "Ban 'Em All" Ferguson and Minnesota AG Keith Ellison. I can only assume that Bonta's working on his own legal effort against Glock, and we'll probably see a competing press release from him in the coming days (though how he'll get around the fact that California has specifically approved several models of Glock for sale in the state remains to be seen). 

The goal here is simple: to ban the sale of commonly-owned semi-automatic handguns. Chicago's lawsuit demands that the federal courts block city residents from purchasing a Glock anywhere in the state, and I suspect that Platkin and his fellow prohibitionists will soon issue similar demands. They can't ban all handguns outright, thanks to Heller, but they're embracing the gun control lobby's argument that Glocks and many other semi-automatic handguns are "readily converted" to machine guns. That means, at a minimum, they should be restricted arms covered under the National Firearms Act. Democrats like Rep. Eric Swalwell and Rep. Jake Auchincloss of Massachusetts have been calling on the ATF to reclassify Glocks for several years now, and it looks like the gun control lobby has decided now's the time to make a concerted effort to turn their gun ban fever dreams into reality. 

So what happens next? Well, Glock will respond to Chicago's complaint in the next few weeks, but the litigation is just one component of the gun control lobby's strategy. They'll need explicit buy-in from the Biden administration at some point, and while I told Keane that I would be surprised if the ATF were to announce a formal reclassification ahead of the elections in November, I'm starting to think I was overly optimistic. If Biden wins four more years in the White House, I'm certain that the ATF will move against Glock, but I think it's now a very real possibility that Steve Dettelbach will make that change before Election Day. 

In fact, I'd say the only thing stopping Biden from making that move now is concern that it would inspire more votes against him than for him. Biden desperately needs to shore up his base of support between now and November, and putting the most popular pistol in the U.S. in his administration's crosshairs would thrill Moms Demand Action and Everytown. It would also fire up gun owners and Second Amendment advocates and give even those skeptical of Donald Trump an important reason to vote for him this fall. 

Regardless of Biden's political calculations, the gun control lobby is making its intentions crystal clear. Yes, they want to ban so-called "assault weapons," but they're not stopping there. They've got their sights set on a sweeping semi-auto ban that would ensnare tens of millions of gun owners and turn the vast majority of handguns into prohibited items. Chicago's lawsuit was the first step, but as the anti-gun AGs demand letter shows, the anti-gunners are aiming to take their attack nationwide. 

It's critically important for Second Amendment supporters to remain informed about these efforts to curtail our right to keep and bear arms, and we can't depend on the legacy media to give us the information we need. I'm proud of the work that we're doing here at Bearing Arms to alert gun owners to the existential threats the Second Amendment is facing, but we need support from 2A defenders like yourself to help spread the word about the anti-gunners agenda and how we can fight back. 

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