In a setback for lawful gun owners, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) on Friday posted its final rule on stabilizer braces. The agency said that individuals with these devices must register them within 120 days from when the final rule appears in the Federal Register.
The rule, 2021R-08F, is to be posted on the Federal Register on Monday.
The posting on the ATF website reads:
“This rule is effective the date it is published in the Federal Register. Any weapons with “stabilizing braces” or similar attachments that constitute rifles under the NFA must be registered no later than 120 days after date of publication in the Federal Register; or the short barrel removed and a 16-inch or longer rifle barrel attached to the firearm; or permanently remove and dispose of, or alter, the “stabilizing brace” such that it cannot be reattached; or the firearm is turned in to your local ATF office. Or the firearm is destroyed.”
The proposed rule implemented a standard called “Worksheet 4999,” which used a point system to determine if a gun featuring a pistol brace would be classified as a short barreled rifle (SBR).
The ATF chose a different direction, however, and will now classify virtually every pistol with a brace as an SBR.
The new regulation will impact millions of law-abiding Americans who now have pistol stabilizing devices, and it is a sweeping change for the official designation of firearms.
What were before considered to be pistols will now be categorized and regulated as SBRs and fall under the National Firearms Act (NFA).
The rule basically asserts that any weapon that is designed, redesigned, manufactured or modified to be fired from the shoulder will now legally be an SBR.
There is also the possibility that if a firearm only features a surface area that could permit it to be fired from the shoulder, then it may fall under the definition of an SBR.
The ATF will consider any pistol with a length of pull equivalent to that of a rifle to be an SBR.
Further, the addition of an optic device on a pistol that requires eye relief in the same fashion as a rifle will be an SBR. Merely the addition of a scope is apparently enough to warrant the change in designation.
The agency will study how the weapons manufacturer markets their legal products to determine if adding a particular device to the weapon makes it an SBR. It will also consider how the shooting community utilizes the weapon and could change classifications even if individual shooters use it as the manufacturer intended.
The ATF appeared to make an exception for stabilizing braces designed and intended for persons with disabilities and not for shouldering a firearm as a rifle. The agency’s posting specifically described such devices as “designed to conform to the arm and not as a buttstock.”
The latest regulation to deprive gun owners of their rights will not go unchallenged. Gun Owners of America’s Erich Pratt noted that the government “continues to find ways to attack gun owners,” and this latest attempt will be stridently opposed.
He vowed the organization will collaborate with its industry partners and a suit will be filed shortly.
Lawmakers and the ATF continually act to make criminals out of law-abiding citizens. The Second Amendment is in effect, and as long as it remains a part of the Constitution, opponents of gun rights insist on slicing pieces of it away at every turn.
And with these new restrictions on pistol stabilizing braces, it is the duty of freedom loving Americans to resist these encroachments on our precious liberties.
