FL Lawmaker Pushing For "Ghost Gun" Restictions

Florida is sometimes called “The Gunshine State” because of its attitude toward the Second Amendment. After all, before Parkland, they were pretty pro-gun. Not only that, but despite passing a number of anti-gun measures in the wake of the school shooting, they quickly got back on track to a large degree.

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Democrats would rather the legislature focus on more gun control, and at least one anti-gun lawmaker is turning her sights on so-called ghost guns.

3D-printed guns are the types of weapons that State Sen. Linda Stewart wants to target. However, she’s not confident she’ll get support, as any amount of gun control rarely does in Tallahassee.

“3D printing machines are much less expensive, like $1,500 on Amazon, and you can make as many guns as you like without this bill,” Stewart said. “You could just go and manufacture as many of these as you like, and hand them out to your friends, there’s no licensing involved.”

Stewart is introducing Senate Bill 372, which would require 3D-printed firearms contain at least four ounces of metal, and prohibit the use of certain plastic polymers that can withstand someone pulling the trigger.

“I just know we’re going down a very dangerous path if we don’t do this,” Stewart said.

Stewart goes on to talk about undetectable guns, arguing that even though they’re illegal to make, it doesn’t mean people aren’t making them.

Thus kind of making the point over just how useless laws like this actually are.

See, if it’s against the law to make undetectable guns, it’s clear the laws banning that activity doesn’t work worth a damn. If people are still making undetectable firearms–and while they might still make them, most potential designs I’ve seen are too bulky to make any real threat–then the laws don’t prevent people from doing something illegal.

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So Stewart’s bill is nothing more than to expand the scope of the law so that it will interfere with more law-abiding citizens while still not stopping criminals from doing anything.

Honestly, she’s beating her head against the wall on this and doesn’t even realize it.

Criminals aren’t going to suddenly obey the law because you passed just one more law. They’ll do whatever it is they want to do.

Yet those who use their 3D printers lawfully will be stuck having to obey a new law that criminals will pay little attention to. For all the demonizing of “ghost guns,” especially undetectable ones, Stewart can’t point to a single instance of an undetectable gun being used in a crime. Not a single instance in the entire state of Florida. That should tell you something.

All the hysteria about 3D printing firearms is really nothing more than lawmakers being upset that people don’t have to ask the government “Mother, may I?” when buying a gun. They want that level of control over who buys guns because as they tighten the noose around who can buy and who can’t, they can limit people exercising their Second Amendment rights.

Further, all the paperwork requirements anti-gunners want to saddle us with can become a de facto form of gun registration.

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3D printing destroys all of that. It allows anyone to build a gun. Yes, that includes prohibited people, but they were getting guns anyway. What the technology does is make it so that any attempt to regulate guns is destined to fail even more miserably than before.

Stewart and people like her have turned to trying to regulate 3D printing of firearms, an even more doomed proposition than regulating guns in general.

People like her want control over what you can and can’t buy. Nothing else, and if you can get around them, then it shows just how useless their efforts really are.

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