A “ghost gun” is a firearm that isn’t registered with the government. Especially and specifically modern sporting rifles made from so-called “80 percent lower receivers”: parts that do NOT have to be registered as firearms with the ATF. Federal law says you can sell them, but not if your intent is to make money (go figure).

State law says . . . different things in different places. [Click here for a quick trip down the ATF rabbit hole on 80 percent guns.] California’s civilian disarmament extremists (a redundant term, but there it is) are looking to close this freedom loophole with SB 808, which would force “ghost guns” into their regulatory maw. Or, if you prefer, to turn their legal owners into criminals.

Gun rights advocates are organizing opposition but how do you defend “untraceable guns”? By saying that guns shouldn’t be traceable, to guard against government tyranny. Good luck with that.

[h/t DrVino]

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108 COMMENTS

  1. This will be very difficult to fight. If an established case gets a foothold kiss 80% complete receivers goodbye in 3, 2, 1….

    • Then what, we go to 75% receivers? It’s ridiculous. They either are or are not firearms. What they’re trying to regulate here is simply homemade firearms — forcing you to register them and get serial numbers for them. I’m sure they’ll try to block these xx% receivers also, but then you have to block chunks of aluminum and everything else. They’re just paperweights.

      AND…. I lost 35 sanity points listening to DeLeon’s gibberish. Despite seeing it for years and years and years, I’m somehow still just absolutely astounded at how little these people actually know about the subject matter they spend so much time on. They hate and attack these things with every fiber in their body and have no damn clue whatsoever how they function, let alone have even a beginner’s grasp of basic terminology and such. It’s just so painful to see.

        • Yes.

          Many education majors are some of the most ignorant people I know. EdD degrees are worth about the price of a book of first class stamps, IMO.

      • I totally agree. He has no inkling of what he is talking about and he is proposing legislation for the regulation of a topic of which he knows nothing.

        30 caliber clips? What is that? I didn’t know clips had a caliber… the caliber of the gun is more likely .223/5.56…. ??

        30 bullets in half a second??? That is 3600 rounds/minute. Ridiculous.

        Serial detectable number? What does that even mean?

        All of his statements are just total falsification. He is another idiot standing tall and proudly denouncing the evil guns and feeling great about it the entire time. Even his concept for the legislation itself is ridiculous. If a criminal has the capability of building a rifle then he has the capability of grinding off a serial number. This legislation does absolutely nothing but make legal guns held in the hands of home builder’s traceable. It does nothing at all. A criminal doesn’t care about laws regarding serial numbers. He does whatever he wants anyways.

        This is classic government fearing the people legislation. They want to know what you have! that’s it. Because it does nothing to stop or prevent crime.

      • ….
        They hate and attack these things with every fiber in their body and have no damn clue whatsoever how they function, let alone have even a beginner’s grasp of basic terminology and such. It’s just so painful to see.

        Now, apply this to every other law that is passed and you know why the laws are so screwed up.

    • Article 2 of the Bill Of Rights, The Rights of the People to Keep and Bear Arms, Shall Not Be Infringed…
      No other argument should be needed…

  3. I think you might want to check the facts on the article. You can sell them, but you can’t make them with the intent to sell. You can pass them on, but then is is only in my state and the laws obviously vary from state to state.

  4. This will undoubtedly pass through The Lost State’s utterly disconnected legislature, and Gooberner Brown Nose will invariably sign it with glee in heart and a smile on his stupid face.

    • Give Moonbeam a little credit. He’s been surprisingly more restrained on the budget than the average CA politician, and he has even vetoed some anti-gun bills. Brown is far from perfect, but he’s about the best that could come from CA these days.

  5. Gtfo. I’m so sick of California politics. It must be a disease or better yet a cancer. A “ghost gun”? Lol

  7. On the other hand, they’ve been preaching a sort of shamanism where guns are possessed by evil spirits for years. Believing they’re ghosts is the next theological step

  8. And what percentage of crimes are committed with these ghost guns? I suspect this is another case of trying to punish pre-crime.

    • There was a spree shooting last year in San Diego (I think) where the individual had an AR and a 1860 colt Army (reproduction) black powder gun, he was a prohibited person, and so he made himself an 80% AR–only the receiver being a “firearm”, the upper and the ammo were easily obtained from any old gun store, and the lower he had to build, but the resulting firearm was unregistered. I am fzzy–he killed about 6 I think, two at a house (his father and brother), another in the street, and the rest at a college campus fairly near by. Shot up a lot of stuff in between.

    • I think the santa monica shooting back in november or so was done with an ar that started as an 80% receiver

  10. I won’t make any friends with this post, but it’s gotta be said.

    It’s gut check time for California gun owners.Either you value your freedom enough to move to a state which respects your rights as a free person, or you’re staying for other reasons which justify the sacrifice of your gun collection.Because you can’t have your cake and eat it too.

    The problem isn’t ignorant reps like that Senator Deleon.The problem is a constitutency which thinks guys like that represent them. You can protest, start a petition, join Calguns (ha!) , donate to legal action, and it’s all for naught.Why? Because for every gun owner who knows the stakes and cares, there are ten who don’t give a fuck.And at the voting booth, the ten uncaring gun owners and the five odd committed antis crush the Molon Laabe crowd.Unless we invent some sort of MIB style memory ray zapping the last thirty years of socialist cultural memory out of the California population, it’s game over.The people have spoken, and they want Uncle Government to disarm their neighbors.

    How else can CAs laws be so awful and yet the state sells more guns then many others combined?

    Oh right….the GOP is just as bad on gun rights.Almost forgot that predictable retort.While it may be true in that we can choose between a Democrat led socialist autocracy, or a corporate led GOP oligarthic autocracy in the national parties…..that doesn’t stop anyone from electing ***local ***reps with brains.

    The fact that the People of Deleons district think he’s a good voice says it all.In The Great California of the Future, civil disarmement isn’t just a buzzword:it’s a goal of the common voter.

    And nothing you or I will do can change that.The Titanic is sinking, and now is a good time to find either a Bible(or your preferred religious text) or a lifeboat.

    • CA gun owners serve a purpose. So long as we exist, any law to outright ban firearms in the state would fall in the courts. In the absence of a significant population of lawful gun owners, the state would argue that noone has the standing to challenge its laws and the courts would very likely let those laws stand as unchallenged.

  12. I feel as though I need to make it
    my mission to decipher what on Earth that man was saying. I mean, talk about unicorn farts; a military style AR-15 military automatic undectable assault sniper Afghanistan weapon (used by the military) that you can get through YouTube, using .30 caliber clips that can fire at a rate of 3,600rpm! The stuff that DARPA can only dream of!

    • I am not aware of any single – barreled AR-15 or AR-10 capable of a 3,600 rounds per minute cyclic rate. Unfortunately, I am aware of multiple ignorant politicians spouting inaccurate information during their campaign against the 2nd Amendment.

      I’ll make this deal: fire 30 rounds through an AR in .5 seconds and you can ban whatever you want. What a dumbass.

      • +1, however, don’t make that challenge. They would find a way to try and make you believe that there is one capable of doing it. They wont be able to explain what it is in English or common since, but they would try!

  13. IMO, the way to defend untraceable guns is to argue that they should be untraceable because arms possession is a fundamental right and not a privilege, and as such, it is not the government’s business who owns what guns. Yes, it infringes on law enforcement’s ability to solve certain crimes, but then so does the right against unreasonable search and seizure and the right against being coerced into acting as a witness against oneself (right to remain silent). Of course, I doubt any of this will fly in California.

    • hat argument was lost long ago in California. Handguns have been registered for years, and beginning January 1 of this year, all long gun sales are registered as well. There have been no successful challenges.

  14. I am in the process of saving up for at least ten 80% lowers. F*ck these people. This guy is a moron of biblical proportions, by the way.

  15. How can they do that with 80% receivers? It’s basically a block of aluminum. It’s like banning blocks of marble because they could be turned into pornographic statues.

    • The easiest ones to build are polymer. The aluminum ones require a drill press or a cnc machine–and cnc machines have been eliminated from the mix by the ATF, who contends that a person providing a pre-programmed cnc machine is “in the business” of manufacturing lowers. Now it is much harder to mill an aluminum lower.

  16. The non-SHOT Show clip was shot in CA, right? That was a parody, right? Exactly how high was that clown when he started running his mouth? I started twitching when he made a mistake; his ignorance of the subject matter was amazing. I must have looked like I was having a seizure. At one point he seemed mystified by the gun before he clumsily picked it up – I guess he was afraid it would shoot him. Then he nonchalantly waves the muzzle at the cop behind him. Just incredible. [Shakes head in amazement]

  19. If even the ATF doesn’t require it, how in the name of all that is good are you supposed to register it so it can be “tracked” to all the owners?

    • The bill requires a would-be builder to apply for and obtain from the DOJ a unique serial number before starting the build, and further require that the number be engraved on the firearm. thus, any firearm that did not have a serial number would be contraband and subject to summary seizure. and yes, police and (especially) forest service cops will demand inspection of any black rifles they come across. One FS agent was so notorious, the Eldorado County Sheriff revoked the FS’ authority to enforce state law. the involved agent has now appeared in another county, and up to the same old tricks.

  20. This can’t be real. I refuse to believe that a group of humans elected this man to represent them.

  22. I refuse to anger myself by watching the vid, but the static image of him holding to two AR’s just screams, “Say hello to my little friend!”. He even looks kind of Pachino-esque.

  23. Wowie. Seriously, I don’t know how he got his hair to look that natural, what with the special helmet he has to wear and all.
    Dat eyeroll tho- priceless.

  24. This guy says they want to add serial numbers to antiques that never had them? Yeah, that’ll fly. Another thing. Those rifles were not illegal because they were built in a grage, they were illegal because their features did not comply with California law. One for example was a SBR, and we can’t have NFA items here. I don’t know what was wrong with the “sniper rifle.” Further, although it is easy enough o drive to another state to buy them, it is already illegal to have magazines with greater than 10 round capacity (yeah, yeah, with an exception for grandfathered mags). LAst but no least, he kept holding up an aluminum lower–since when is such an item “undetectable”?????

    By the way, the reason he keeps getting elected is (if you hadn’t noticed) a Hispanic from Southern California. the Hispanics vote democrat, and they vote for their own. Until he is term limited out, he is one of the most vocal and powerful gun banners in the state. He is also trying to reintroduce an ammo registration bill with his anti friends.

  25. I have been thinking of getting an 80% lower specifically because of this nonsense–it is the only way to have an unregistered long arm (other than having purchased it prior to Jan 1). The only thing holding me back is the cost of the custom features I would include. I could get the lower for $50, but by the time I add in a good trigger( $150 plus), tube and stock, etc. I am looking at close to $300–without an upper. and the uppers I like or could build run $600 and up. Pricey. I may just by a lower and build it out so I never have to worry about getting a serial number.

    • I thought about building a rifle with an 80% polymer lower but the cheap parts total up to an M&P Sport or DPMS, and I haven’t seen a lot of barrels lately.

    • You can get just about even part for the AR on ebay and a number of other websites and your patience will be rewarded with good prices. Sarco.com has inexpensive trigger groups, dhgate.com has good prices on most of the high end upgrades, and Brownells.com sells 30 rnd mags for under $10. Of course sites like Blackthorneproducts.com sells complete kits for AR 15s and 10s, less the lower receiver and they do sell lowers as well. You can also check on Armslist.com for complete uppers and 80% lowers. You can buy 80% receivers for a number of guns, the AR’s may be the most popular but the 1911 isn’t that far behind and the 10/22 is also a popular build. You can also build your own AK but they require a bit more skill to build because of the riveting and/or metal bending they require.
      Buy em or build em, whatever you do, keep em locked and loaded and close at hand.
      Remember, according to Thomas Jefferson, We The People are the Militia and gun ownership is a Patriotic Duty, not just our American Birthright (as per Article II of the Bill of Rights).

  26. The people in California are off the hook with their paranoia.
    How many 80% guns have ever been used in a crime? I’ve never heard of it happening.

    • The guy who shot up half of San Diego a while back (and murdered 6) used a gun made from an 80% lower.

      • Ah, but would this bill have stopped him? Is there anything here that would have actively restricted him from being able to obtain the weapon or would it just make it more illegal?

        • Even if they do end up regulated in CA, which wouldn’t surprise me, as long as an 80% lower is available in Nevada, Arizona, or Oregon, they’re still obtainable by anyone with enough money to rent a car.

          And on being used in a crime… I’ll be damned.
          Not that it matters though. Cars are highly regulated and that didn’t stop some loon from running over ten people with his car last year in CA.

  27. This man has no knowledge of firearms. If i take his statements at face value the first gun is chambered in .300 BLK or commie 7.62. It is also capable of emptying a “30 round magazine clip” in half a fracking second. The other is used in Afghanistan (closest thing to it is an SDM-R, and it’s a little different) and is automatic. My favorite part is when he indicated a lack of a serial number over the trigger on the right side. This man is willfully ignorant, and shouldn’t be out in public unsupervised.

    • Even if it could empty a magazine in half a second by some method besides removing the base plate, That doesn’t make it more dangerous. You can’t aim and acquire 30 separate targets in that amount of time.

      These idiots make my blood boil! They back up their erroneous premises with arguments that have no bearing on the topic and are incorrect to begin with!

  28. Oh k…. Mr Deleon… you are a complete idiot and you have little to no real firearms knowledge. Let alone anywhere near the machine technology knowledge you would need to even begin to comprehend how even the most simple of firearms are made or even work. Never mind the process of turning an 80% receiver into a working firearm.

    Persons like yourself make claims like that a barrel shroud ‘is the shoulder thing that goes up’. If you walked into any other line of worked and began sling buzz words so blatantly out of context and without ANY functional knowledge in this subject you would be laughed out of the office. But fourtently for you, you as a politician, are allowed to sling buzzwords to your heart’s content. Completely shielded from the damage your class of stupidity will do.

    I award you no points… and may Eugene Stoner have mercy upon your soul.

  29. I like the idea of the personal satisfaction of building from an 80% lower but I really dont understand the advantage of it over a known 100% lower. If some universal confiscation started occurring I’m pretty sure all my weapons will be lost in an unfortunate canoeing accident. Can somebody provide some hypotheticals of the advantages of the home built 80% in the resistance to some of the recent CT/CA/NY gun grabber laws?

    • If no one knows you have it it’ll be harder for them to come get it… and questions about a canoe trip would not be as difficult.

      • Except that we’re all posting on the internet.
        No gents, 80% lowers or not, I think it’s a little too late for us to remain unidentified if it really came down to it.

    • so you mean you’d prefer me and my cousins to switch sides? I don’t know which is more frustrating – your racist paranoia or your tactical blunder of turning friends into enemies. Actually, you’re probably just a gun grabber trolling here, trying to spread unrest.

      • No, what I am saying is that there are too few of you. Mexicans here vote overwhelmingly for gun control. How do you think DeLeon got elected in a Mexican dominated Senate district? Face it, Hispanics, like blacks, vote overwhelmingly for gun control. Did you ever look at the voting record of the Congressional Black Caucus on gun control? You need to get some facts before you spout off.

  32. Every time this “man” speaks, I die a little inside. He is the same mouth breather who tried to outlaw buying more than 50 rounds of ammo in a month, banning online sales of ammunition, and requiring an ammo permit to buy ammunition.

    He also stated that minority women buying large amounts of ammunition is suspicious.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsRQdZLlqK8

    • I go on Youtube to purchase all of my lower receivers.

      Casper the Friendly Ghost helps me make my gun. That’s why it’s a ghost gun. He’s great with a drill press.

      All of my 30 round magazine clips can feed all of their rounds in 0.223 seconds. It’s awesome!

      I buy all of the ammo for my female friends, because if they buy too much ammo, it’s suspicious. But I’m a white guy, so it’s ok.

      I’m a criminal, so I’ll waltz down to the law enforcement office to get my serial detectable number for my unregistered homemade Casper gun.

      Oh, and I make automatic rifles for all of my snipers.

      (I’m not sure I can handle any more stupid from this guy.)

  33. For what it’s worth, DeLeon also goes after airsoft guns every year, trying to make bright toy-like colors mandatory. Currently it’s SB 199. Also affects BB guns. Paintball guns (some of which look quite similar to firearms) are exempted due to paintball companies’ lobbying. In fact, they encourage the bill in the hopes of eliminating the competing airsoft industry. The effect would be felt nationally as the vast majority of airsoft guns are imported via CA from China/HK/Taiwan/Japan.

    • Stupid. If someone points a colored gun at you and you assume it’s a toy, you’re ignorant of modern guns. You can bet a police officer won’t assume it’s a toy…

    • ” The effect would be felt nationally as the vast majority of airsoft guns are imported via CA from China/HK/Taiwan/Japan.”

      That’s bogus, as they’re shipped in sealed containers last I heard. And they certainly could make landfall somewhere other than Oakland. Like maybe another Pacific coast state?

      • Perhaps, but it’s a talking point that’s brought out. Most of the major retailers started in and are still in CA. It’s kind of the epicenter of airsoft in the US.

        At any rate, the law would do nothing for safety for the reason Hannibal pointed out.

  34. Folks, the knowledge is out there. They can NEVER remove knowledge from anyone. There are detailed instructions on how to mill out or drill out lower and upper receivers on the internet from numerous places. From a 0% lower (brick of metal) to an 80%, the instructions are there.

    That said, this is sad. What this guy and many like him fail to realize is that criminals will get guns or other weapons to do their deeds. Criminals do not care if their weapon has a bunch of numbers stamped into it or not. Serial numbers more than likely do not “trace” back to the criminal anyway! And if they did, a dremel would take care of that.

    Yes, there is a paper trail of every serialized firearm, but those trails do end, somewhere. All (and I mean ALL) of my firearms do not “trace” back to me. I will never register my guns, or otherwise inform government r-tards of my firearms. And if (when) the confiscation comes, I will not give them a damn thing. And I will start producing AR’s and selling them for cost, just so people will still have a way to defend themselves against people that believe what this you-hoo is spewing.

    • “Folks, the knowledge is out there. They can NEVER remove knowledge from anyone.”

      Well, someone sure removed it from Mr. DeLeon. If it was ever there at all.

  36. A “ghost gun” is a firearm that isn’t registered with the government.

    If you’ll excuse me, gentlemen, I’m going to make myself a ghost cup of ghost tea and a ghost bowl of ghost cereal before the baby wakes up and needs her ghost diaper changed.

  39. Do life-long California people even realize that most other states don’t even bring up this kind of foolishness for discussion? Conservatives need to vote with their feet, leave California and let them drown in their own foolish left-wing philosophy.

  40. Why must people who run for office in weinerfornia ALWAYS be mental cases? Is it a prerequisite?

  42. It is painful to watch, but I think this is actually a good video. Even someone who is not familiar with firearms should be able to comprehend that this guy has NO clue what he is talking about, that he is BS’ing his way thru the talk (rather poorly). I think we have our new “the thingy that goes up” replacement candidate. Can we get him elected nationally?

  44. I thought nobody was talking about registering all guns.

    I thought nobody wants to take your guns.

    If you’re not going to take them, why do you want them registered? How about we take guns away from the people who use them in crimes? Really, I don’t get why another law restricting people who follow the law will do anything about violence by people who don’t.

  45. i have never heard so many redundant terms used at once. magazine clip capacity high capacity firearm clip military styled mag clip??????

  47. This guy is an idiot. He states its a 30 cal when its obvious its a 5.56. Next he says its an automatic weapon which would mean it needed a federal tax stamp to own. Next he says the sniper rifle is just like the ones used in Afghanistan which is BS, The army doesn’t use weapons like that.
    How is it sub intelligent people get elected to office especially in California.

  50. 30 rounds in half a second is complete bs. And that “automatic Sniper Weapon” that is used by troops in Afghanistan? Its not actually used by the troops. The standard Sniper Rifles for the US Military are Bolt Action Rifles, which include the M24 and the M40A3. This man makes me sick. Not going to explain why because I think most of you feel the same way.

  52. This may not be the popular comment but most of us are guilty when it comes to allowing them to strip us of our American Birthright, aka the Bill of Rights. Almost every one of us is willing to compromise when it comes to those rights and that’s the problem. We say it’s Ok to “infringe” on someones right to keep and bear arms, when it comes to someone who’s been convicted of a felony, it’s an acceptable infringement to require us to get a background check when we buy a gun, it’s Ok with most of us that States require us to apply for a License to carry a concealed weapon, yet EVERYONE of these is an Infringement on the Right to Keep and Bear Arms. When it comes to protecting and exercising our Birthright, the subject should be Black or White, no gray area should be acceptable, compromise is compromise.
    Our battle is NOT over the 2nd Amendment of the US Constitution, why you ask…. Amendments to the Constitution can and have been changed, thus the term Amendment, however those first 10 Amendments are also in a separate document which constitute the Bill Of rights, they are not simply Amendments to the Constitution, they are something else entirely, they are above the Constitution, they are our American Birthright, they are our Rights, irrespective of Government, no gray area. We The People either have the right to Free Speach, Freedom of the Press, Freedom to Worship (or not worship) as we chose, and of course the Freedom to Keep and Bear Arms or we don’t. Having served in the Military, that is why I served, to defend our Freedoms, not some of them, not some version of them, all of them, as written.

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