Andrew Clyde & 107 Co-Sponsors Introduce Legislation to Block ATF’s Universal Background Check Regulation
Jose Nino
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On December 13, 2023, Georgia Congressman Andrew Clyde introduced legislation to block funding for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ (ATF) proposed universal background check regulation.
The legislation currently has 107 co-sponsors.
Last August, the ATF unveiled a proposed regulation, 2022R-17, redefining what it means to be a gun vendor, which ended up broadening the number of gun sales that must go through a background check.
ATF director Steven Dettelbach stated that the new regulation “[clarifies] the circumstances in which a person is ‘engaged in the business’ of dealing in firearms.” In doing so, it places private firearms sales under the same point-of-sale mandate that exist for retail firearms sales. Some of those requirements include the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) check, which the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) runs.
The legislation recently introduced to defund the ATF’s anti-gun ventures is titled the “Stopping Unconstitutional Background Checks Act.”
The Act highlighted: “No Federal funds may be used to finalize, implement, or enforce the rule proposed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, entitled ‘Definition of “Engaged in the Business” as a Dealer in Firearms,’ in the notice of proposed rulemaking 2022R–17, signed by the Attorney General on August 30, 2023, or any substantially similar rule.”
When he announced the bill, Congressman Clyde stated, “[The ATF’s] proposed rule marks the Biden Administration’s latest attempt to infringe on Americans’ Second Amendment rights, institute universal background checks, and advance the Left’s radical gun control agenda.”
He added:
Private citizens should not be forced to jump through unelected anti-gun bureaucrats’ unconstitutional hurdles in order to engage in lawful firearms transactions. The ATF’s concerning pattern of criminalizing the American people for exercising their unalienable right to keep and bear arms must be met with swift congressional action. My legislation provides a simple solution to block the implementation of and funding for this unlawful, convoluted, and burdensome rule — protecting Americans’ Second Amendment liberties from the Biden Administration’s nefarious overreach.
Gun Owners of America (GOA), the National Association for Gun Rights (NAGR), the National Rifle Association (NRA), and the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) all support the campaign to defund the ATF’s universal background check rule.
Aidan Johnson, GOA director of federal affairs, said the following about the effort to derail the ATF’s universal background check scheme:
While Congress has made it clear that the federal government may not create a registry of guns and gun owners, that’s not stopping Joe Biden’s ATF from using every tool in its arsenal to weaponize the background check system to build a digital database of firearm transaction records. This backdoor ‘Universal Background Check’ rule, which attempts to require anyone selling just one gun in a year to keep gun registration paperwork, is a violation of the Second Amendment and is only enforceable with ATF’s illegal gun registry — which the ATF Director admits is already very real. GOA thanks Congressman Clyde for standing up to this rogue regime’s actions.
Hunter King, NAGR director of government affairs, proclaimed, “Yet again, the ATF is attempting to circumvent Congress and the law-making process inorder to implement their radical gun control agenda on the American people, this time in the form of universal gun registration.”
King praised Clyde’s political venture to defund the regulation and urged for Congress to get behind Clyde’s legislative effort.
NSSF senior vice president and general counsel Larry Keane offered his two cents, remarking:
Implementing the proposed rule would harm industry members’ ability to run their businesses because it will divert ATF resources away from providing required services to the industry like processing NFA forms, issuing import permits, renewing licenses, and providing product classifications — all of which already take too long — to license and inspect gun owners and collectors Congress does not require to have a license. NSSF thanks Congressman Clyde for his leadership to assert Congress’ sole authority to legislate and to rein in ATF’s overreach.
Indeed, the ATF is a pernicious, bureaucratic institution that must be flushed down the toilet. Unaccountable bureaucracies that can’t be punished at the polls for their bad political behavior present a major threat to civil liberties.
Clyde’s efforts efforts to defund the ATF are very much welcome in this to restore the Second Amendment. The ultimate goal here is to fully defund and abolish the ATF. Nothing short of that would be a disservice to the countless gun owners who clamor for the restoration of the Second Amendment.
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