It’s probably worth noting that the ATF’s pistol brace rule was formally published in the Federal Register today, making it official.
The countdown has started. If you have a braced pistol, you have 120 days to decide how to proceed.
You may have heard that those attempting to register braced firearms as short-barrel rifles, may have an issue. Some claimed that if the form isn’t processed in 88 days, then it’s automatically denied. A more cogent explanation clarifies that.
When you apply for your tax stamp, the ATF goes to the FBI’s NICS for a background check. Unlike a firearm sale, which can proceed if the NICS check doesn’t come back in three days, at 88 days without a NICS response, the application is denied. It’s then up to you to go to the FBI and ask “What the heck’s going on with my background check?” and resubmit your stamp application.
Meanwhile, the Firearms Policy Coalition has already filed its lawsuit challenging the rule. I’m not sure if they were the first, because it looks like it was a dead heat with the Wisconsin Institute for Law & Liberty’s lawsuit.
Good luck, folks.
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I have been following this even though I have no dogs in the hunt. Mostly to keep an eye on how the BATFE bunch acts with this issue, as their track record lately has been less than stellar. And they have not failed to keep up their good job.
It would seem that a federal agency, issuing a several hundred page opinion that took them enormous amounts of time and effort, not to mention money, to come up with, should have by this time have gotten it spot on. Apparently all is not as it seems, since before it could be finalized and published, they had to issue clarifications, since even their own agents could not explain the minutiae of the totally unclear and unreasonable change to a rule that the congress never made.
One can hope that with the Republicans in somewhat control of the House of Representatives, there will be some kind of court ruling that brings the BATFE in line with other case law that makes the agencies subject to the control of congressional laws and not the other way around. That is, if we can still count on the United States remaining a nation of laws.