Biden shows off a ghost gun as he implements new rule to crackdown on privately-made firearms

President Joe Biden on Monday took aim at ghost guns, the privately made firearms without serial numbers, using his regulatory power to get around Washington gridlock on the issue.

The president showed off one of the gun kits for sale on the internet, pointing out anyone can purchase one and have a gun assembled in under 30 minutes. 

‘This is the gun,’ Biden said during his event in the Rose Garden where he walked over to show off the kit. He lifted the gun in the air to show it more clearly.

‘It’s not hard to put together with a little hand drill at home. It doesn’t take very long. Anyone can order it in the mail. Anyone.’

‘A felon, a terrorist, and a domestic abuser go from one gun kit to a gun in less than 30 minutes,’ he added. 

Under a new rule being submitted by the Justice Department, the parts of gun kits that are readily convertible to firearms are subject to the same regulations as traditional firearms.

The goal is to crackdown on the proliferation of ‘ghost guns,’ which are often assembled from kits, do not contain serial numbers, and are sold without background checks, making them difficult to trace and easy to acquire by criminals. 

These ‘ghost guns’ are increasingly being used in federal gun crimes. 

‘It isn’t extreme. It’s just basic common sense,’ Biden said of his administration’s new rule. 

And he argued guns made from kits, were still guns. 

‘If you buy a couch you have to assemble, it’s still a couch. If you order a package like this one over here that includes that parts that you need and directs the assembly of a functioning firearm, you bought a gun,’ he said.

Biden also used the event to take another jab at trying to get a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) director confirmed. He introduced Steve Dettelbach, a former Senate-confirmed U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, as his nominee.

The president, as he has done in the past, managled the abbreviation for the ATF, calling it the ‘AFT.’ 

But correct pronounciation is not the only battle the White House faces in the days ahead. 

Dettlebach’s confirmation is likely to be an uphill battle. Biden had to withdraw the nomination of his first ATF nominee, gun-control advocate David Chipman, after it stalled for months because of opposition from Republicans and some Democrats in the Senate.

Monday’s event, however, was also aimed at breaking through the gridlock in Washington to address gun deaths and mass shootings amid a surge of violent crime in cities being seen post pandemic. 

Congress has deadlocked on legislative proposals to reform gun laws for a decade, and executive actions have faced strong opposition in federal courts. Meanwhile progressives are getting more vocal in call on Biden to take executive action.  

‘None of this absolves Congress of the responsibility to act,’ Biden said of his regulatory move. ‘We need Congress to pass universal background checks, and I know it’s controversial but I got it done once — ban assault weapons & high capacity magazines.’

Speaking at the event with Biden was Mia Tretta, a Saugus High School shooting survivor.

Tretta described what she experienced when two of her friends were killed by a fellow student and she survived a shooting in the stomach. 

‘For reasons I will never know he had brought his father’s weapon to school,’ she said of the shooter. ‘A firearm as we come to know as a ghost gun.’ 

Gunman Nathaniel Berhow, 16, had unloaded the entire magazine of his .45 semi-automatic rifle in 16 seconds. 

Tretta praised Biden’s work on combatting violent gun crime. 

‘We have a president who realizes that thoughts and prayers alone are not enough,’ she said.

For nearly a year, the ghost gun rule has been making its way through the federal regulation process. It is expected to draw litigation in the coming weeks.

Gun Owners of America said it would immediately fight the rule.

‘Just as we opposed the Trump Administration´s arbitrary ban on bump stocks, GOA will also sue Biden´s ATF to halt the implementation of this rule,’ Aidan Johnston, the group’s director of federal affairs said in a statement. The group believes the rule violates the U.S. Constitution and several federal laws.

But gun safety advocacy groups, like Everytown for Gun Safety, which pushed the federal government for years to take action on ghost guns, applauded Biden’s moves and insisted that both Dettlebach’s appointment and the finalized rule will help combat gun violence.

‘Ghost guns look like a gun, they shoot like a gun, and they kill like a gun, but up until now they haven´t been regulated like a gun,’ said John Feinblatt, Everytown’s president.

Justice Department statistics show that nearly 24,000 ghost guns were recovered by law enforcement at crime scenes and reported to the government from 2016 to 2020. 

It is hard to say how many are circulating on the streets, in part because in many cases police departments don´t contact the government about the guns because they can´t be traced.

The new rule changes the current definition of a firearm under federal law to include unfinished parts, like the frame of a handgun or the receiver of a long gun. It says those parts must be licensed and include serial numbers. 

Manufacturers must also run background checks before a sale – as they do with other commercially made firearms. The requirement applies regardless of how the firearm was made, meaning it includes ghost guns made from individual parts, kits, or by 3D-printers.

Federally licensed firearms dealers must retain key records until they shut down their business or licensed activity and then transfer the records to ATF as they are currently required to do at the end of licensed activity. 

Previously, these dealers were permitted to destroy most records after 20 years, making it harder for law enforcement to trace firearms found at crime scenes.

The rule goes into effect 120 days from the date of publication in the Federal Register.