Just this morning, TFA discussed a letter from Rep. Biggs dated June 29, 2022, to ATF asking some questions about reports of ATF abuses and whether internal ATF “policies” existed that essentially encouraged federal firearms license revocations for any possible violation that could be shown. We encouraged Tennessee’s Second Amendment supporters to call their Congress members because none of them signed the Biggs’ letter – and apparently you are.
We have heard from two of Tennessee’s House members so far. Rep. DesJarlais’s office emailed TFA and sent another letter, dated June 27, 2022, (attached below) that other House members signed, including Rep. DesJarlais and Rep. Harshbarger from Tennessee. We have also heard directly from Rep. Mark Green who indicated his support for the letter (so far, Rep. Green is the only member of Tennessee’s Congressional delegation who has indicated that he is supporting and will be attended the TFALAC’s annual event on September 3, 2022).
As an update, we are also advised that although the June 27, 2022, letter requested ATF’s reply by July 8, 2022, that so far the Biden administration has not responded to the letter – surprise!
The 1968 Gun Control Act is the law that created the federal firearms licensing system and is the one being abused. ATF started abusing it almost immediately after its passage and the abuses were in full swing by the 1970s. Things were bad enough that by the early 1980s American citizens were demanding that Congress do something to stop the ATF’s abuses.
By February 1982, the US Senate, Subcommittee on the Constitution, released a report which examined ATF’s abuses that ultimately led to legislative tweaks to the statutory language of the Gun Control Act which tweaks were enacted in the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986. The 1982 Senate report noted (words that are even truer today) just the highlights of some of ATF’s reported abuses. See 1982 Senate report excerpt, pages 22-23, below.
But it took Congress approximately 6 years to actually do something in the 1980s. That something was a weak attempt to rein in the ATF and that something was the Firearms Owners Protection Act of 1986. It is clear that Congress acted too slow and not forcefully enough. Americans are the victim of that choice by Congress and our rights, as protected by the 2nd Amendment, are the focus of the administrative abuses.
It is time for Congress (particularly if the Democrats lose control this year) to put a stop to Biden’s and ATF’s abuses that are directed at our rights as protected by the 2nd Amendment and their attack on the 2nd Amendment “supply chain”.
What are some things that can and should be done? Well, they should just repeal the 1968 Gun Control Act and abide by the 2nd Amendment’s “shall not be infringed” mandate. But, assuming that Congress and presumably the GOP if in control lack that willingness, then perhaps:
1) Make clear in the statutes that anyone who can legally purchase a firearm has a constitutionally protected right to engage in the business of buying and selling firearms.
2) Require that ATF be required to demonstrate intentional criminal conduct by a licensee before a dealer’s license can be terminated. No more of this “technical violations” or “a single error” standard that ATF has used since 1968 should apply. If the dealer cannot be convicted of a knowing and willful criminal transfer of a firearm to a prohibited person then there should not be a license revocation.
3) Prior to any other adverse action (e.g., a civil fine) require that ATF prove that a licensee has failed to correct their records after written notice from ATF of specific violations/errors and that the licensee is by a preponderance of the evidence unable to maintain compliance going forward.
4) Place in the statutes that any “agency” hearings on license adverse actions must be conducted under the Administrative Procedures Act and not in some off-the-record hearing based on unsworn testimony where the licensees are being routinely sandbagged by ATF. Also require that any appeal of an agency adverse action is to be a TRIAL de novo, with no presumption of correctness in favor of the agency, and that such trial take place in a federal district court which is required to use the Bruen Court’s test for the protection of 2nd Amendment rights.
5) Require ATF to pay the legal fees of any attempted license adverse action that is unsuccessful.
6) Prohibit ATF from future regulatory changes or “reinterpretations” to the language of the statutes enacted by Congress.
7) Defund ATF’s license revocation authority entirely, with the exception of revocations based on federal felony convictions for selling to prohibited persons, and limit ATF’s other adverse action authority to civil fines.
Our rights are under attack by Biden, the “perpetual agency state” and by continued inaction in Congress. The letters are proof that Congress knows there is a problem and where some of the problems are. While it could be said that all of the problems are in the executive branch and most are in ATF itself – those problems exist only because Congress has been unwilling since the early 1980s to control the “beast”.
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