If you’re a doctor, the Hippocratic Oath of “first do no harm” is your guiding principle. Your responsibility is to properly diagnose a patient’s illness and then prescribe the appropriate treatment to heal them. Doctors who disregard this oath and purposefully neglect symptoms or offer treatment that is deliberately harmful to the patient are guilty of medical malpractice.
It’s an appropriate analogy for the action the Biden Administration has taken to address violent crime. Their approach focuses not on punishing criminals and addressing root causes but on cracking down on law-abiding citizens. According to President Biden and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) Director Steve Dettelbach, the United States’ violent crime problem is a result of Americans’ ability to freely exercise their Second Amendment rights. Their treatment plan is to restrict that right.
This is the only logical explanation for the numerous steps they’ve taken to blame violent crime on lawful gun owners and make it harder for Americans to equip themselves for self-defense. Previous examples include pushing for a ban on so-called “assault weapons” that millions of Americans commonly own or criminalizing millions of lawful gun owners overnight by re classifying short-barreled rifles.
Their latest move is yet another misdiagnosis. The ATF recently announced measures to finalize a new rule to dramatically redefine which types of gun sellers are required to conduct federal background checks. Under the guise of cracking down on the so-called “gun show loophole,” the Biden Administration’s action will create significant confusion and potentially threaten law-abiding gun owners and sellers with prosecution, even when they’ve been acting well within the law. Not only that, it will have no impact on curbing violent crime.
According to a report from The Reload, “The rule casts a broad shadow over private sales across the country. While it doesn’t outlaw sales by those without a license, its vague standards will likely leave many Americans unsure if they can sell their guns without one. The punishment for anyone violating the rules could be up to $250,000 in fines and five years in federal prison or both.”
Some of the vague standards include whether a private seller “repetitively” turns a profit – but the ATF doesn’t define what “repetitive” means. You could also fall under the rule’s jurisdiction if you’re a law-abiding citizen who, for example, sells a firearm to a family member if you maintain a record of the sale. The ATF has even said that no sales are required for a private seller to need a license, only the “intention” of a sale. It is intentionally ambiguous and it will almost certainly drown lawful gun owners in miles of red tape or potentially lead to criminal prosecution. In what way will this possibly reduce violent crime?
There is no evidence that legal, private firearms sales are a driving force behind mass shootings or other crimes committed with guns. Furthermore, the remaining gun sales – those from federally licensed firearms dealers – all go through federal background checks. The problem is illegal guns on the streets and activist prosecutors’ failure to put criminals behind bars.
At best, this new ATF rule is a clear case of the Biden Administration and Director Dettelbach misdiagnosing a problem. At worst, it's an abuse of power and a veiled regulatory threat to target lawful gun owners. It’s no surprise that it’s been met with backlash by the lawmakers who supported the bill which the Administration is using to justify the new rule, the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) of 2022.
U.S. Senator John Cornyn (R-TX), one of the law’s GOP leads, said, “The Biden admin should expect for this rule to be struck down because it is unconstitutional.” Fellow U.S. Senator Joni Ernst, (R-IA), who voted for the BSCA, remarked that “President Biden is twisting the law to fit his liberal gun-grabbing agenda.”
They are absolutely correct. If the Biden Administration does not reverse course, Congress or the federal courts must step in to prevent this executive malpractice and abuse of power from continuing.
Katie Pointer Baney is the managing director of government affairs for the U.S. Concealed Carry Association and the executive director of the USCCA for Saving Lives Action Fund.