In news that comes as a shock to no one, only only a tiny handful of braced pistol owners jumped through the hoops of completing an eForm 1 for braced pistols they owned during the just-completed “amnesty” period. According to The Reload, ATF says it received just over a quarter-million applications before the “grace period” for registrations closed on May 31st.
A quarter million? Various sources put the number of pistol stabilizing braces owned by Americans at between 10 and 40 million. Doing simple government school math, that means less than three percent of the devices have been registered.
Candidly, as an Illinois resident who continually does his best to act as a burr under the saddle of Gov. J.B. Pritzker and Attorney General Kwame Raoul, I registered mine. The Gov and the AG would love (l-o-v-e) nothing more than to see film of someone like little old me perp-walked on the Chicago TV news on firearms charges.
It wasn’t easy. Some of my fellow Illinoisans had a C&R license (required for Illinois residents to possess SBRs) but gave up on the daunting registration form. Frankly, it took teamwork from a couple of friends and hours for me to complete my registration, but now I think I finally have the process down.
Here’s William Kirk at Washington Gun Law on the news.
From The Reload . . .
The ATF told The Reload on Friday it has received just over a quarter million applications to register pistol-brace-equipped firearms…
That number represents just a fraction of the braced guns believed to have been sold in the decade since the ATF first classified a version as outside the scope of the NFA. In the impact assessment for the rule, the ATF estimated that three to seven million devices exist. However, the Congressional Research Service puts the number much higher at somewhere between 10 and 40 million.
That puts the registration rate for pistol-brace-equipped guns at between .6 percent and eight percent.
Longnecker noted that owners of the affected guns could also comply with the rule by either dismantling the firearms and destroying the braces or turning them over to the ATF. He said the agency does not know how many Americans may have taken those routes.
Feel free to chime in with your experience doing the eForm 1 — or not — in comments below.
No dog in this fight personally since I have never owned a pistol brace. I am more of a purist personally and I find the braces to be ugly add-ons. But if I were a pistol brace owner, I would be far more inclined to remove the brace and safekeep it somewhere else for when this unconstitutional BS gets overturned, than to draw ATF a map to my house and announce that I had a braced gun. Same reason as opposing the registration phase of PICA, which is blatant self-incrimination after the fact.
No idea where this will end up but SCOTUS has been pretty clear that making law is the purview of Congress – not bureaucrats – and creating felony penalties for simply owning a legal product on the basis of a ‘rule change’ is also unconstitutional.
Amen!
I would also posit that a LARGE majority of owners of these guns have absolutely no idea what is going on here, or that they are now felons.
Mmm hmm
Finally know of a couple of people that actually registered theirs. Everyone else said screw it
If you are a member of Firearm Policy Coalition, Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners Foundation, or have a pistol brace manufactured by Maxim Defense you are covered under preliminary injunctions placed by the 5th Circuit Appeals and 5th Circuit in the Southern District of Texas. These injunctions keep BATFE from enforcing their rule, NOT LAW, with regard to those parties. The question now is whether the suits against this rule get settled first or the USSC declares Chevron Deference dead law in Loper Bright Industries v Raimundo in their fall session. Either way this debacle will be resolved before the new year. When Chevron Deference, bad law, is removed Joe Biden and his Merry Band of Gun Grabbers can kiss their ability to harass through ANY executive agency goodbye! After this the abuse of the commerce clause by the Feral Grubberment is on the chopping block. The Texas suppressor case will see to that incursion.