By Evan Pliego
Gun control has been a rampant ideal and legislative motive that has been crawling and growing through states throughout America. While some believe it should be mandatory, some don’t care, and others believe it’s straight up unconstitutional. Nonetheless, the ATF (Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms) has held its claim and involvement in firearm regulations and gun control.
In 2022 a letter was made by the ATF to firearm Licensees, which stated that (some) Forced Reset Triggers are to be classified as ¨Firearms¨ and ¨Machine Guns¨. Forced Reset Triggers are a ¨drop in¨ product that was first made by Rare Breed Triggers. These are a modified control group (FCG) that replaces the original trigger mechanics of the firearm.
A FRT allows a shooter to increase how fast they shoot a Semi Automatic (one shot per trigger pull) rifle, by forcibly resetting or returning the trigger back to be pulled again. Due to the function, a FRT does Not allow the rifle to fire more than one round per trigger pull, like a binary trigger or a fully automatic FCG.
Although the ATFs regulation did not last very long, in July of 2024, a federal judge dismantled and struck down the administration’s ban on FRTs, also overturning the ban on Bump Stocks the month before.
Judge Reed O’Connor ruled in favor of the Guns-rights group that had sued the US-Justice department and ATF. This ruling cited the ATF´s interpretation of laws that limited the possession and rights of machine guns. Referring back to the ATFs own statement on FRT´s and how they do not cause triggers to fire more than one round per trigger pull.
O’Connor´s statement during the overturning of Bump Stocks notes the ¨tragic nature¨ of a shooting, which can also be broadly applied to all shootings: “No matter how terrible the circumstances, there is never a situation that justifies a court altering statutory text that was democratically enacted by those who are politically accountable.” This quote can greatly shine light into the ATF´s seeming habit of overstepping their jurisdiction to make and enforce laws and regulations on firearms.
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