Biden Administration Issues Final Rule to Close "Gun-Show Loophole"

[AlmostHeaven]

https://www.politico.com/news/2024/04/11/biden-gun-show-firearms-rule-00151655

The Biden administration is moving to expand background checks for gun purchases, fulfilling a key demand of advocates following the deadly shooting at a school in Uvalde, Texas.

The final rule, expected to be submitted Thursday to the Federal Register by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms, would eliminate a loophole that has allowed sales of guns without background checks of guns outside of brick-and-mortar stores.

The rule was issued under a provision of the 2022 Bipartisan Safer Communities Act. It requires that anyone who sells guns for profit to have a license and that buyers be subject to a background check, including at firearms shows and flea markets. The administration had been working on the rule since last spring. Once publicized, it will take effect in 30 days.

The so-called gun show loophole has for years allowed unlicensed gun dealers to sell firearms without background checks at gun shows, on the internet and out of their homes. The new rule, the most sweeping expansion of firearms background checks in decades, will apply to more than 20,000 individuals engaged in unlicensed gun dealing and affect "tens and tens of thousands of gun sales" each year, an administration official told reporters during a call previewing the announcement.

"This single gap in our federal background check system has caused unimaginable pain and suffering," Vice President Kamala Harris said on the call.

The vice president noted the 25th anniversary next week of the mass shooting at Columbine High School, which was carried out with weapons purchased through the gun-show loophole. She also pointed to the 2019 shooting in Midland and Odessa, Texas, where a man killed seven people and wounded dozens of others. A background check stopped the shooter from purchasing a gun at a sporting goods store in 2014, but he later purchased an AR-15 from an unlicensed seller he met online.

"So many communities have been torn apart by acts of violence committed with weapons bought without background checks," she continued. "So in the memory of all those we have lost today, as the head of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, I am proud to announce that all gun dealers now must conduct background checks no matter where or how they sell their merchandise."

After Congress passed the gun safety legislation in June 2022 following a shooting in Uvalde, Texas, gun safety groups have pushed the White House to use it to expand background checks by clarifying which entities are considered "engaged in the business" of selling firearms. Doing so would not fulfill the president's plea for universal background checks, as it would not apply to all sales, including private transfers. But the rule's publication still marks a step forward in the administration's more incremental efforts to regulate gun sales through implementation of the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.

The final rule comes a year after the president issued an executive order directing Attorney General Merrick Garland to develop and implement a plan to clarify the definition of "engaged in business." The Department of Justice issued the proposed rule in September. The administration has also made an effort to release previously undisclosed firearms data, offering a fuller picture of the illegal firearms market in the U.S.

An analysis published last week from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives found sales by unlicensed dealers were the most frequently used gun trafficking channel. From 2017 to 2021, the ATF traced more than 68,000 of these illegally tracked firearms to unlicensed dealers.

[LanceBV]

[splithoof]

That is why those communists are attempting to redefine what it is to be a dealer. The end goal is to confiscate everything, but to first do that, they must build a registry. By slowly getting everything catalogued, they will then know where the bulk of weapons are to be found.
We need to make ALL sales of weapons over-the-counter, do away with all this 4473 BS, and the entire GCA of 1968 as well. Likely will never happen, but it is a good lesson for any other startup nation wanting a free citizenry.

[bohoki]

i got an idea how about we make a caged community for people who are not allowed to own guns and keep that area gun free

[Silence Dogood]

.pdf of the final rule

https://www.atf.gov/rules-and-regulations/docs/ruling/atf-final-rule-definition-engaged-business-dealer-firearms/download

As 2A History posts on X:

https://x.com/2aHistory/status/1778458302529073223

Key phrase on page 31 of the pdf of the final ruling..

from the .pdf on p. 31:

. . . while selling large numbers of firearms or engaging or offering to engage in frequent transactions may be highly indicative of business activity, neither the courts nor the Department have recognized a set minimum number of firearms purchased or resold that triggers the licensing requirement. Similarly, there is no minimum number of transactions that determines whether a person is ?engaged in the business? of dealing in firearms. Even a single firearm transaction, or offer to engage in a transaction, when combined with other evidence, may be sufficient to require a license. For example, even under the previous statutory definition, courts have upheld convictions for dealing without a license when few firearms, if any, were actually sold, when other factors were also present, such as the person representing to others a willingness and ability to repetitively purchase firearms for resale.

[Silence Dogood]

That is why those communists are attempting to redefine what it is to be a dealer. The end goal is to confiscate everything, but to first do that, they must build a registry. By slowly getting everything catalogued, they will then know where the bulk of weapons are to be found.
We need to make ALL sales of weapons over-the-counter, do away with all this 4473 BS, and the entire GCA of 1968 as well. Likely will never happen, but it is a good lesson for any other startup nation wanting a free citizenry.

This ^ is why we should protect self-made-non-serialized.

As you say, "likely will never happen". Fighting 50 year old laws is harder than fighting proposals and recently enacted laws.

i got an idea how about we make a caged community for people who are not allowed to own guns and keep that area gun free

That^ is rich.

[E Pluribus Unum]

I see this as a bigger issue than firearms.

They are attacking federalism at it's core. The country was designed to operate as independent mini-countries free to govern themselves with a small federal government.

Each passing decade marches us closer into a stronger federal tyrant.

[AlmostHeaven]

That is why those communists are attempting to redefine what it is to be a dealer. The end goal is to confiscate everything, but to first do that, they must build a registry. By slowly getting everything catalogued, they will then know where the bulk of weapons are to be found.
We need to make ALL sales of weapons over-the-counter, do away with all this 4473 BS, and the entire GCA of 1968 as well. Likely will never happen, but it is a good lesson for any other startup nation wanting a free citizenry.

https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/documents/remarks-upon-signing-the-gun-control-act-1968

Lyndon B. Johnson
36th President of the United States: 1963-1969

Remarks Upon Signing the Gun Control Act of 1968

The Government can help protect its citizens against the random and the reckless violence of crime at gun point. We have come here to the Cabinet Room today to sign the most comprehensive gun control law ever signed in this Nation's history.

Some of you may be interested in knowing-really-what this bill does: --It stops murder by mail order. It bars the interstate sale of all guns and the bullets that load them.

--It stops the sale of lethal weapons to those too young to bear their terrible responsibility.

--It puts up a big "off-limits" sign, to stop gunrunners from dumping cheap foreign "$10 specials" on the shores of our country.

Congress adopted most of our recommendations. But this bill--as big as this bill is--still falls short, because we just could not get the Congress to carry out the requests we made of them. I asked for the national registration of all guns and the licensing of those who carry those guns. For the fact of life is that there are over 160 million guns in this country--more firearms than families. If guns are to be kept out of the hands of the criminal, out of the hands of the insane, and out of the hands of the irresponsible, then we just must have licensing. If the criminal with a gun is to be tracked down quickly, then we must have registration in this country.

The voices that blocked these safeguards were not the voices of an aroused nation. They were the voices of a powerful lobby, a gun lobby, that has prevailed for the moment in an election year.

But the key to effective crime control remains, in my judgment, effective gun control. And those of us who are really concerned about crime just must--somehow, someday--make our voices felt. We must continue to work for the day when Americans can get the full protection that every American citizen is entitled to and deserves-the kind of protection that most civilized nations have long ago adopted. We have been through a great deal of anguish these last few months and these last few years-too much anguish to forget so quickly.

So now we must complete the task which this long needed legislation begins. We have come a long way. We have made much progress--but not nearly enough.

I see this as a bigger issue than firearms.

They are attacking federalism at it's core. The country was designed to operate as independent mini-countries free to govern themselves with a small federal government.

Each passing decade marches us closer into a stronger federal tyrant.

The Democratic Party has, for nearly a century, actively sought to invert the country's founding ideals and transform the United States of America into a European-style unitary state with all-powerful top-down national governance.

[E Pluribus Unum]

The Democratic Party has, for nearly a century, actively sought to invert the country's founding ideals and transform the United States of America into a European-style unitary state with all-powerful top-down national governance.

Agreed

Sad, really.

[TruOil]

I see this as a bigger issue than firearms.

They are attacking federalism at it's core. The country was designed to operate as independent mini-countries free to govern themselves with a small federal government.

Each passing decade marches us closer into a stronger federal tyrant.

This is true, and we have Abraham Lincoln and the Civil War for starting us down that road. The war established that the states did not have the right to withdraw from the union (which was probably a good thing in the long run) and further established federal government sovereignty over the states 9which at the time was through force of arms and now through the force of laws). From that point, the bureaucratic state was born, and has been growing ever since. Lost in all of this was the essential preamble to the Constitution that the States and the People created and were to be sovereigns over the federal government, at least with respect to state issues and individual rights.

[DrewN]

LOL, how does a 450 (!) page rule clarify ANYTHING?

[DentonandSasquatchShow]

If I can be arrested and put in jail for violating this "Rule" then it ain't a rule, it's a law. And last time I checked my pocket Constitution the only body that can make law is Congress.

So **** Biden and anyone that goes along with this.

[ARDude]

Under this "rule", if I were to sell a firearm that was gifted to me. And cost me zero dollars. And decided I didn't want it any more...I would not be able to sell it for a profit unless I have an FFL!

So stupid....

[bohoki]

of dealing in firearms. Even a single firearm transaction, or offer to engage in a transaction, when combined with other evidence, may be sufficient to require a license. For example, even under the previous statutory definition, courts have upheld convictions for dealing without a license when few firearms, if any, were actually sold, when other factors were also present, such as the person representing to others a willingness and ability to repetitively purchase firearms for resale.

i will admit there are probably gunshow people who without licences buy/trade and sell/trade guns they may aquire just for the purpose of flipping

but reading deeper it seems to not really affect the typical person who has a gun and for whatever reason just wants to sell it to another resident of their state

[M76]

Here's a loophole the occupying leftist pols across America should be put through