During his 2022 State of the Union address, President Joe Biden promised he would "keep doing everything in my power" to eliminate "ghost guns you can buy online and make at home." But Biden actually tried to do something that was not in his power: He purported to ban that previously legal business by administrative decree, provoking a preliminary injunction that was expanded last week.
In a rule that took effect last August, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) rewrote federal law in a vain attempt to prevent Americans from making their own guns. That rule is part of a pattern: The Biden and Trump administrations both have sought to unilaterally impose new gun controls, reversing longstanding ATF positions while defying the rule of law and the separation of powers.
