The ATF is changing rules aplenty, and they're a massive departure from years gone by, when everyone in leadership there was as anti-gun as they came. It's almost universally good news for us, to say the least.
Yes, I'm happy overall with where things are headed.
However, things aren't perfect, and Gun Owners of America is a little less than pleased by what we're seeing.
In particular, they have one problem, but it's kind of a big one.
The pro-gun rights group Gun Owners of America is calling out the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives over what GOA calls a “fake rollback” of the Biden Administration’s “Engaged in the Business” rule.
GOA has been battling the Trump Administration Department of Justice over the rule ever since President Donald Trump took office for his second term. And while it looked like the DOJ had decided to do away with the rule in recent proposed rulemaking, GOA says there’s more to the story.
GOA: The replacement rule keeps the Biden framework in place
“That rule tried to twist the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act to impose backdoor universal background checks by redefining who counts as a ‘dealer,'” GOA said in a recent news release on the rule. “Now, ATF has proposed a replacement rule that claims to ‘rescind’ the Biden rule, but in reality keeps key parts of its legal framework in place and leaves gun owners exposed.”
Your firearms list could still be used against you
According to GOA, under the current proposal, ATF says it will drop some of Biden’s presumptions and narrow definitions, but it openly states that “some sections of the Biden rule will be retained.”
“ATF still treats everyday behavior by gun owners as suspicious: keeping a simple list of your firearms, reselling the same model within a short window, or even just offering to sell a firearm can be used as evidence that you are ‘engaged in the business’ without a license,” GOA explained in the release. “The agency continues to push the idea that intent alone can be enough evidence to prosecute law-abiding gun owners as illegal firearms traffickers, despite the court’s ruling and the clear limits Congress placed in law.”
Consequently, GOA said, the ATF cannot keep the Biden-era “Engaged in the Business” framework on the books.
“The rule must be rescinded in its entirety,” GOA wrote.
I mean, that's fair.
Have you ever had a turn of your fortunes in a short period of time? One month, you're doing great, then a couple of months later, everything went to crap?
I suspect most of you have to some degree or another.
One of the problems with this "engaged in the business" rule is that it's too easy to take someone who is in this kind of situation, who bought a gun in March, then needs money for rent in June, and sells the gun, could be considered an illegal dealer when that's not what's happening.
Literally no one would say that about someone who bought a car, then sold it in a short window of time. They're not an unlicensed car dealer or anything. That's true of any other physical product out there. People buy, then sell later on, and if money gets tight, they're going to do it a bit quicker than they might otherwise.
The idea that selling a firearm could get you hammered as an illegal dealer is stupid, and it's stupid even if it's not about money getting tight. If I buy a product, it's mine. I should be able to do what I want with it so long as no one else is endangered by my actions. That includes selling my property because I want to sell it.
It might be different if I'm selling dozens of guns in that short window, but the problem with the rule, as I understand it, and as GOA understands it, is that it doesn't differentiate between one sale and a hundred. That's a big problem.
For the most part, I like the new rules. Leaving this, however, isn't one of them.
Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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