This is my second installment preceding the upcoming October 8 argument in Garland v. VanDerStok, a challenge to the regulatory redefinition of the term "firearm" in the Gun Control Act. By expanding the statutory definition, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms & Explosives (ATF) in its 2022 Final Rule purports to criminalize numerous innocent acts that Congress never made illegal.
Until the new rule, a kit with partially-machined raw material that can be fabricated into a firearm was not considered to have reached a stage that it is a "firearm." To prevent Americans from making their own firearms from such material, which has always been and remains lawful, the bugbear term "ghost guns" was recently coined. In its VanDerStok brief, the government argues that "anyone with basic tools and rudimentary skills" can "assemble a fully functional firearm" from such kits "in as little as twenty minutes."
As explained in my last post, that is refuted by none other than the former Acting Chief of ATF's Firearm Technology Branch, Rick Vasquez, who reviewed and approved hundreds of classifications about whether certain items are "firearms." As he explained in his amicus brief, fabrication of a firearm from these kits is a complex process requiring skill and special tools beyond the capacity of the average person.
