Saturday, November 26, 2022

Brace Yourself For Black Friday Weekend?

One item to consider for purchase this weekend is a brace for an AR or AK pistol you may consider building.

Certainly there are some good sales for them going on at the moment from various vendors for Black Friday.

Since it appears that ATFE is about to issue their ruling in December that effectively makes AR15/AK braced pistols SBRs and it seems they may offer a free registration of such pistol braced SBRs saving $200 per pistol thus made by regulatory fiat into an SBR there is an opportunity here.

There's also some peril in this ruling, as some states allow pistol braced pistols but do not allow SBRs, and the legal interplay between state and federal law and their competing definitions can be problematic. 

The interplay can also be beneficial. In Michigan, for example, you can have a firearm that is both a Federal registered SBR and a Pistol under Michigan law at the same time, which allows for some interesting and useful things to happen if you have a concealed pistol license.

In 2019 there were some 413,167 SBRs in the NFRTR.

There are estimated at least 3-7 million braced pistols out there, which would increase the number of SBRs on the registry almost 20-fold.  Since those are rookie numbers we ought to pump those numbers up some this weekend.

Anyone else think statistical proof that 7,413,167+  SBRs are in circulation would make a convincing argument that SBRs are in common use. Hence SBRs as found to be in common use should not be banned by a State nor need to registered Federally as unusual and dangerous weapons?

Hence go forth and get a a brace and assemble yourself or buy a completed an AR pistol prior to the regulation coming out.  It's fun, it's easy, and you will likely get a free Form 1 and help make SBRs common use items. 

In short ATFE classifying braced pistols as SBRs may just have a wonderful unintended consequence of providing the fodder for a challenge to the banning of SBRs by states and requiring their registration and control federally on the basis of the common use test.

So go on out and brace up this weekend!

6 comments:

Scott said...

So if my braced AR Pistol is reclassified to an SBR, does that mean I cen replace the brace with a regular stock after registration? Since it's now a rifle?

Old NFO said...

Sigh... not tempting fate over here.

B said...

I'm with old NFO. Nope Nope Nope.
The ATF doesn't get a reason to show up unannounced at my home without a warrant.
Don't need it, don't want it.

Aaron said...

Scott: Correct, once it is an SBR, you can stock it how you want it.

Old NFO: There is that, but it looks like ATFE is pushing through with the regulation regardless of what we want or what should be - namely that braces shouldnt cause a pistol to become an SBR. So, we might as well push for an advantage including perhaps getting rid of the whole SBR control entirely under the common use test as we've got a reasonably good court composition for it so might as well push

B: Old wives tale. Having a papered SBR does not give ATF cause nor permission to enter or search your home without a warrant.

Matthew W said...

"IT'S A TRAP!!!!"

Aaron said...

Matthew W: ATFE is going to run with this regulation regardless. I'd like to see this become a trap for THEM and the gun banners.

Their pushing this effective transformation of arm brace pistols into SBRs creates an unintended consequence for them and gives us one heckuva opening to legally argue SBRs are de facto in common use and thus protected under Heller, dismantling all bans on SBRs nationwide.