New York Assemblyman Felix Ortiz is a legislative genius. When last we checked on his work, he was planning to GPS-enable every new gun in the state, and require firearm owners to have just the sort of insurance that the state was busily shutting down. Amidst all of that, I somehow missed another one of his bills.

A03779 Establishes a statewide database to maintain and track coded ammunition; establishes penalties for individuals who violate such provisions; also establishes the ammunition coding system database fund.

That’s all bad enough. Basically, it would require every single, individual cartridge in the state, for handguns and “assault weapons,” to be stamped with a unique identifying code and tracked from point of manufacture to the end buyer. In other words, microstamping and individual bullet registration.

Even better: the law, if passed, would outlaw current stocks of ammo. Anyone who possesses “non-coded ammunition” must dispose of it no later than January 1, 2022. Possession of such verboten gun food would then be a class A misdemeanor, good for a year in prison.

Obviously, no ammunition company is going to take on the logistical nightmare and expense of registering and tracking serial numbers for New York. They simply won’t sell there. Manufacturers in the state would pull out or shut down.

The computer industry will probably enjoy the business, though, as companies compete for the fat government contract to build a data center cable of registering and tracking millions of individual rounds every year — assuming someone bothers to service the NY ammo market. It would likely require a facility on the near scale of the NSA’s Utah Data Center.

Roadrunner supercomputer
By LeRoy N. Sanchez, Records Management/Media Services and Operations – http://www.lanl.gov/news/albums/computer/Roadrunner_1207.jpg, Attribution, Link

As I was reading the bill, an interesting point struck me. I ended up going through it multiple times to be sure, because something I usually see in these victim disarmament schemes doesn’t seem to be there.

There is no exception in the bill for law enforcement or the military.

Should this monstrosity pass, I’m going to invest in popcorn futures. The show, when law enforcement realizes this applies to them, will be extremely entertaining. Passage will not endear the legislature or the governor to the police.

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97 COMMENTS

  1. I’ve seen this movie before. I guess the lawmakers go from sublime to idiotic out of incompetence and impotence.

    • ImaYeti,

      There is nothing idiotic, incompetent, nor impotent about it. Politicians and bureaucrats abound who desperately want virtually everyone disarmed and defenseless. They are simply trying every possible avenue of attack to make that happen.

      In this particular instance the politician who submitted this legislation is attempting to make ammunition ownership and possession so expensive, onerous, and legally perilous that everyone “voluntarily” bows out.

      It is a downright fiendishly clever attempt to sidestep court precedents which nullify FIREARM “regulations” since those precedents say nothing about AMMUNITION.

      • That sort of argument is not “clever”, it’s “nice”, in the old fashioned sense of “obtuse”, or “unreasonably fastidious”. Judges see such arguments as attempts to thwart the clear meaning of the law and their rulings with word games, and they don’t look kindly upon them.

  2. So happy to be leaving this Leftard state next week to South Carolina!! Good luck to all the pro 2A patriots who have to unfortunately remain. I HATE NY tee shirt already ordered!!

      • SkyMan77 says: February 29, 2020 at 11:05

        Good call Andy… Fair winds and following seas…
        ___________________________________________________________________________________

        Semper Fi SkyMan77

      • Having spent a great deal of time in these two states, I can’t think of a single reason one would pick NY over SC. Maybe give NY the nid for better Chinese food and nightlife. SC has better climate, taxes, culture, no labor unions, population density, individual rights and lack of unnecessary government regulation, cost of living……..should I keep going?

        • NY has better bagels and pizza… I left over a decade ago and can never find these two essential staples in any significant quality in Idaho, Utah or NV.

          Other than that? NY blows.

    • Good for you.
      Enjoy the freedoms SC “citizens/patriots” enjoy.
      NY is being left to the “subjects/sheeple”.

    • “Andy T says:
      February 29, 2020 at 10:10
      So happy to be leaving this Leftard state next week to South Carolina!! Good luck to all the pro 2A patriots who have to unfortunately remain. I HATE NY tee shirt already ordered!!”

      Please to have you IF and only if you leave ALL of your voting habits behind.

      I’m a native born South Carolinian and as such want to preserve my native culture intact. We’re working on getting the few restrictive gun laws corrected, it will take a lot of power leverage to do that. If any of our former Democrats turned Republican lites think they have allies “from up north” they’ll continue to drag their feet.

      As a Southern Nationalist, I want repeal of many laws, and don’t mind saying that some folks won’t like the changes I support.

    • So we need the same ID for multiple weapons? what happens when a criminal decides to copy the code on the firing pin and leave false code brass lyin around a crime scene?

      • Why when the criminal could just go to a few ranges and grab handfuls of brass. It would make for a hell of a mess for CSI if there were 50 different stamps.

        • Why would they bother? A vanishingly small number of crimes are solved through forensic firearms analysis. At best it gives you a little more circumstantial evidence.

  5. This Ortiz creep doesn’t seem to be a particularly bright bulb. Where was Planned Parenthood when we needed them?

  7. Serious question to the Armed Intelligentsia:

    What can we do to stop scumbag politicians and bureaucrats from attempting this sort of garbage in the first place?

    Scumbags push this garbage faster than we can challenge them in the courts.

    Scumbags have infinite resources to push this garbage and defend it in the courts.

    Scumbag laws are active for years before we can nullify them in the courts.

    In other words we are forever on defense against opposition with effectively infinite resources (government sponsorship and backing as well as private backing from the likes of Bloomberg).

    I am wondering if a United States Constitutional Amendment would be in order? That Amendment would define something like 20 years mandatory minimum in prison and forfeiture of all personal assets if you sponsor and sign legislation that infringes on fundamental rights which the courts later strike down. Plus the Amendment would require that prosecutors make such cases their highest priority and not allow prosecutors to invoke “prosecutorial discretion” and decline to prosecute such cases.

    And before anyone categorically rejects this approach, note that federal law already reflects this idea with two or three laws about depriving the populace of rights. The problem with the existing federal laws is that prosecutors pretty much never enforce them and prosecutors most definitely never enforce them upon legislators.

    • No way such an amendment gets through. It would require the stripping of “speech” powers from Art.1 Sec.6, and Sec 9. And probably Sec. 10 too. (And in this case would fuck with the NY Constitution Art 3 §11.

      You’re effectively asking for ex post facto law via judicial review, you really don’t want that and the country won’t go for it anyway.

      The answer to your overall question is: become a Costitutional lawyer and engage in lawfare.

      • strych9,

        There has to be a formal and public way to imprison politicians who publicly advocate violating our fundamental rights. Otherwise, politicians can propose bills for anything and everything — even a bill which tasks government with executing an entire demographic — and the only repercussion that such politicians face is possibly losing reelection.

        Don’t get me wrong: I believe that politicians need extremely wide latitude to review topics of interest (and possible solutions) to society. That latitude cannot extend to proposing laws which violate our fundamental rights.

        So, what is the answer that allows We the People to go on offense? Allowing politicians to propose and pass any imaginable law is not it.

        • ” what is the answer that allows We the People to go on offense ”

          That was supposed to be the ballot box and a free (and honest) press. Turns out both are just kind of a meaningless sham, but then, the Founders never really intended the hoi paloi to have any real power

        • “So, what is the answer that allows We the People to go on offense?”

          There are a few options, they’re generally called the “ballot box”, “demonstration” and “civil disobedience”.

          It takes a hell of a lot of hard work to convince people you’re right and get them to march off and vote “correctly” but the alternative road, regardless of how it may meander and how long it takes to get to the final destination always arrives at the same place. That’s a place no one in their right mind wants to go.

          The frustration you voice is understandable and the fact that you feel it is laudable because it means you get the problem. But don’t let that feeling lead you astray. That path leads to understandable but foolish action with predictable results. History is replete with those who fell into the trap of “easy”. Every single one of them either failed or became a tyrant in their own right because they compromised their principles for quick solutions.

          As I’ve said here more times than I can remember: It’s called the high road because it’s fucking difficult to walk. But the high road is the only route to the high ground, which is an excellent spot to emplace machine guns and mortars.

          Or, to quote Rakaa:

          “Dedicated on my honor you can check these vows/
          That’s purpose, power to make the powerful nervous/
          Hard work ain’t easy but easy usually ain’t worth it/
          They say:
          ‘The harder the work well the longer the day
          Easy may come but it sure don’t stay
          Trying to cope, boy, I hope and I pray
          Somebody show me the way'”

    • “Serious question to the Armed Intelligentsia:

      What can we do to stop scumbag politicians and bureaucrats from attempting this sort of garbage in the first place?

      Stop them? We *encourage* them to pass that law.

      Can you think of a better law to drop in Clarence Thomas’s lap?

      Can you image the chuckling and *snickering* he will do as he reads it? And what the eventual ruling will read like?

      As that song from the 70s went – Do it!

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_FViY4–5nY

    • “What can we do to stop scumbag politicians and bureaucrats from attempting this sort of garbage in the first place?”

      Anyone that really believes that passing new laws, amendments, and judicial rulings will stop the scumbags, will be in for a shocking surprise when they discover it didn’t work.

      The only way to accomplish this: direct action against the perpetrators. Once they start disappearing, the remainder will start thinking that it might be wiser for them to abandon their agendas.

      The sad truth is that the generation that originally did take direct action in the late 1700’s is long gone, and the majority of the current crop of Americans are way too comfortable, too sensitive, too weak, too afraid to do anything at all….So we might as well get used to a gun-less, free speech-less society run an all powerful squad of elites who obviously know what is best for us.

      I won’t go quietly…

  8. I guess it would also apply to reloaders who cast their own lead. Right. Like that will work.

    On the other hand, I can think of a simple way to “dispose” of my illegal ammo. 😉

  10. Not to worry GI Joe, you are covered by Federal Supremacy. But Smokey has a problem because nobody is going to sell ammo to the State. In the meantime NY gun owners have a “blast” at the range while you dispose of your soon to be illegal ammo. And finally, the Taurus Judge will be the #1 selling handgun in NY.

  11. “What can we do to stop scumbag politicians and bureaucrats from attempting this sort of garbage in the first place?”

    They can’t be stopped. They can only be voted out of office. If they have enough votes to be elected, they have enough votes to ensure laws that threaten their power are not implemented. But they do serve one good purpose: the barometer of how successfully people who want to maintain the republic are fairing.

  12. The Founders understanding regarding “arms” included ammunition. The operation of the weapon required the powder, patch and lead.
    Arms today also requires the same. Placing these onerous restrictions and costs affects the poor more than any other group.
    Just another tax with penalties.

  15. The only company in the world that can successfully pull this off is Apple and they are not going to become a gun manufacturer.

    Just going by the picture, the firing pin would destroy the number thereby making it illegal to use.

    Ballistic forensics already gets finger prints from spent cases found at crime scenes. I don’t see this as something that can do a better job.

    There still is nothing stopping someone from taking a file to the stamp on the bullet itself.

    If it’s only legal if it has GPS then that mandates the existence of PGS satellites for the rest of the life of the country. What happens when better technology comes out? Does the country hold on to antiquated tech just because of this? That’s worse than what we have with FAX machines.

    Personally, I think they took Judge Dread a little too seriously.

    • “Ballistic forensics already gets finger prints from spent cases found at crime scenes. I don’t see this as something that can do a better job.”

      You may have bee a bit quick to respond, and didn’t think this through.

      Finger prints can only be useful if the target already has finger prints on file (not everyone does). Then, there is no national, universal database of fingerprints a police agency can access. If there were such a database, the technology to manage it, and do digital matches is not present (again, not everyone has fingerprints on file somewhere).

      Regarding micro-stamped bullet casings, the buyer can be identified quickly through the database of registered bullet casings, but only if the bullet casing database is universal, and adequately updated and maintained. Matching alpha-numeric data points is much easier than matching digitized finger prints (images).

      On the whole, firearm tracing, through whichever means, is pretty much TVland fantasy. A criminal could drop a pristine weapon at the crime scene, and never be found through “tracing”. The best any “tracing” can manage is to find the first retail buyer. Isn’t it odd that the FBI remains virtually silent about all these tracing schemes?

      • I know there isn’t a finger print record for everyone. I don’t see that as necessary. But honestly, none of this craziness is. Although I’ve always wondered about biometric security systems.

        • “But honestly, none of this craziness is.”
          Agree. Marking weapons and ammunition for the purposes of investigating crime is just childishness. If it were really useful, we would see all the investigative agencies touting the success rate.

          “Although I’ve always wondered about biometric security systems.”
          Lotta discussion on TTAG about the uselessness of biometrics, even the danger to owners. If biometrics were viable, LE agencies would be clamoring for it, in order to prevent perps from using an agent’s gun on the agent.

      • My obsolete PC, the one I am replacing because it doesn’t have Windows 10, has a terabyte (1000 x 1000 megabytes) hard disk. If each box of ammunition is printed with a serial number sufficient for 100 boxes of ammo for each person in the country, that would be 100 x 350M or 35 billion serial numbers to record, along with the SS or registration number of each person – a total of about 35B x 20 digits or about 700 billion digits recorded. My one little PC will hold this much data! This assumes only that each cartridge in the box is encoded the same, as there is no reason to put different numbers on different cartridges. Absolutely no way this is a good idea, but it can be done with a minimum of computer power. Of course, if the bad guy is shooting a revolver, there will be nothing on the scene to trace.

        • “This assumes only that each cartridge in the box is encoded the same, as there is no reason to put different numbers on different cartridges.”

          Ah, but there is.

    • Yeah, but if you have a Y chromosome you aren’t really female and no amount of pretending will change that fact. Dress how you want, I don’t care. Just don’t expect me to get your pronouns right because I don’t care what they are.

  17. I’m all for this. Everyone (each “end buyer”) buy one box of ammo, take one round out, and pass the remainder onward. In one simple action the whole scheme evaporates as all the “registered” individual rounds of ammo are spread throughout the state (or perhaps even the country). If necessary, they could also be dropped accidently “in the lake” and reported stolen and then recovered and passed on again, and again, and again. This should be enough to give any computer database a mental breakdown.

  19. The bad guys could have a ball with this law. He could go to the shooting range and pick up cases for 9mm and leave them at a crime-seen and drive law enforcement crazy by having to checking out the different cases.

  20. He’s just mad that ammo sales have jumped on Coronavirus fears.

    He’s one of those people who finds this terribly irresponsible because he thinks Coronavirus is a new flavor of Mexican beer.

  21. I believe there is a cure for legislation such as this bill . All ammo ,firearms and accessories manufacturers along with local gunsmith and shops. Need to not sell or service local and state agencies . Along with that any future contracts between the states and manufacturers need to have a clause that triggers a cancelled contract . If the states enact laws that violates the citizens rights. Granted the agencies will not feel the pain right away but a slow strangle. Too many of these bills end up with a leo carve out.

  22. So Remington, Olin and Natec will have to move (that’s if they still manufacture ammo in the state, and not just their corporate offices), and everyone else just refuses to participate in this Virtue Signaling Folly. Stupid is as stupid does.

  24. I like it when they pass laws that they can’t enforce.

    The Georgia Motorcycle Helmet law states you must wear protective headgear that meets the standards of the list supplied by the Georgia Safety Department. There is no list, has never been a list, nor is there the hint of a guideline. If you get stopped and ticketed wearing a dew rag, the judge will toss it out in traffic court because you had some type of protective head gear on. (The dew rag kept my scalp from getting sunburned.)

    Let them write all the laws they want, it they can’t be complied with.

  25. “and require firearm owners to have just the sort of insurance that the state was busily shutting down..”

    Not at all. The insurance the state shut down was the kind where you, the customer, pay a premium in order to gain a benefit (legal representation) if something bad happens. It’s the normal, basic kind of insurance we are used to dealing with.

    People like this schmuck don’t want you to ever be able to benefit from it. He wants you to pay money- a huge amount of it- so OTHER people can benefit.

    Almost sounds like a tax, doesn’t it?

  26. What comes after terabytes in hard drive capacity? Maybe the one after that, too. I’d call him a moron but that would be an undeserved insult to the intelligence of morons.

  27. These nazi gun control zealots just keep reaching in their behinds and pulling out poo to serve to America. There comes a point where these nazi democrats are going to have to be told to take their sicko poo and shove it back up their behinds.

    • Yep. I can hear the stuff rattling its way up I-95 already, just like the black market cigarette trade.

  29. “Anyone who possesses “non-coded ammunition” must dispose of it no later than January 1, 2022. ”

    If this passes, I have a good idea of how it should be used.

  30. “There is no exception in the bill for law enforcement or the military.”

    Well that will kill it dead. You know how much our betters love their carveouts.

  31. “There is no exception in the bill for law enforcement or the military.”

    Good. There shouldn’t be.

  32. So would this mean Bloomie could keep his protective detail only they couldn’t have bullets in their guns? I’m all for that.

  33. Hell if I was a Ammo maker I’d say F that. I’d also tell them They Will never sell any ammo to any LEO in that state. just to give a finger to them.

  34. Before it gets voted on for passage it would be a simple matter to add an exception for law enforcement and the military. That would likely cause a whole new set of issues, and likely the Federal Government would intervene to tell NY to take hike. Criminals don’t give a hoot, so they will violate the law anyway. A “dime bag” of 9mm Luger would be no more illegal than a “dime bag of crystal meth or heroin.

    So, once again, only law-abiding gun owners would be screwed-over.

    Unlike “micro stamping” within the gun, this is almost plausible, but would drive the price of ammunition up significantly (I think) IF ammunition manufacturers accommodate it. A record keeping nightmare…

  35. CA requires “microstamping” capabilities for semi-auto pistols to be considered to be on the “safe roster”, which allows any new guns to be commercially sold on the market in CA, if all the other “safe roster” requirements are met. The micro-stamping technology doesn’t exist (and wouldn’t be cost efficient or effective if it did) so effectively, the types of semi-auto pistols introduced to CA on the commercial market decreases every year. Think about that, and what that means for the future of semi-autos in CA. Way to go New York, following in the footsteps of the follies of the CA gun-control agenda.

  36. I have a question. The picture shows a stamp on the primer. How do you stamp an individual round of ammo prior to distribution from the point of manufacture without igniting the primer? Sure, you could stamp the number before adding the primer material, but how then are you going to start recording all of the different codes in each box of ammo? And as mentioned above, how much of that number will survive the impact of the firing pin?

    • Even assuming you can cross all of those hurdles with highly sophisticated (and currently nonexistent) machinery, how ifs the seller supposed to be able to record all of the numbers for all rounds in each 20 or 50 round box sold? (Basically you would have to bar code every box with all of that info, and then send that to the state daily or weekly or some such, like they do in California for boxes of ammo).

      Then of course is the storage problem, also noted above, one I don’t think California has quite solved with the mass of information being submitted on ammo sales under the new law, and the mass of useless date generated.

      • Laser engraving at the production factory. Etching serial numbers wouldn’t be the problem…cataloguing and tracking would be, though.

        “Microstamping” is a different thing altogether, and not feasible.

        • ““Microstamping” is a different thing altogether, and not feasible.”
          Microstamping is basically just printing letters or numbers in Braille dots.
          No big deal.
          The bigger problem would be if someone swaps the cartridges between two boxes before buying one of them. Then all his cartridges will lead to the other purchaser! Better hope that the one buying your marked cartridges doesn’t commit a crime with them!

      • “…how ifs the seller supposed to be able to record all of the numbers for all rounds in each 20 or 50 round box sold? (Basically you would have to bar code every box with all of that info, and then send that to the state daily or weekly or some such, like they do in California for boxes of ammo).”

        A feature, not a bug. Intent is to end gun and ammo sales through frustration.

  37. I can think of a couple good ways to dispose of non-compliant ammunition. Ortiz.might not like the results.

  39. I suppose with computers and robotic technology stamping every cartridge could be done. The cost if this would raise the price of ammo, then throw in ammo tax, a transportation tax( yah gotta take it out the door) online gets the same, an ammo storage tax,, A special Hazard Insurance( ammunition might catch fire ) an extra permit fee if you have children or elderly in the home. And there you hAve it, a box if shotgun shells cost $26.878 sixty six fifty

  40. Fingers crossed the use an unsigned 16-bit int for storing the resulting serial number 🙂

    One other (maybe not amusing) thought on this, better control your range brass. EVERY one of them. Cause otherwise someone is going to pick it up, reload it and use it in a crime gun.

    • Actually from the pic it is a 8 char alphnumeric.. which gives about.. 3 trillion possible serials.. there are about 10 billion rounds made in the us a year..
      Worldwide I have no idea, but since no nonUS maker is going to do this, ny is banning all ammo imports?

  41. Reloaders will be felons and I’m sure they would prosecute severely. Unfortunately I don’t see how th is is in institutional.
    1. They are not prohibiting your purchase or possession of marked bullets after the law takes effect.
    2. Registration is not confiscation although we know that’s the next game.
    3. Heller allows local and state laws in this case.

    Once again we have an area where no laws or rules existed. It was a given tha ammo was not a gun however that lack of oversight has gotten us ammo back ground checks, laws on storage and age related possession rules, even the types of metal used in bullets. There are no rules that say ” you can buy, sell, make and possess and bullet you Like” so they are filling vacuums. No specific law for or against something was supposed to fall under the 9th but the left can’t count very well.

    Fortunately they can’t prove when a bullet was made or loaded and trying to ban ammo possessed prior runs the law into other problems. The state would have to compensate people for loss of property that now is illegal despite being legal when purchased. A decent judge would see it as a taking under the constitution.
    Or not. Some might think stripping gun owners of ammo and forcing them to buy marked bullets the cops can tag them with a good idea for society. Too bad criminals won’t go along with it.

  42. Arms aren’t infringed: all you need is a magic thing that doesn’t exist, and you’re fine.

    My pet unicorn and I don’t see the problem.

  43. Why? (Other than the obvious, to make life hard on gun owners) What would be the point?. The ability of law enforcement to trace ammo is not a significant tool in solving criminal cases (TV shows notwithstanding). If it had ever been established that ammunition forensics was the the keystone to convicting criminals than any criminal with an ounce of brains would have figured out that shotgun shells should be the ammo of choice for all their crimes. How could law enforcement track individual lead pellets?

    • Easy, same as with tasers. Add several serial numbered strips of plastic in with the shot. Every round scatters then all over.
      Oh God what have I done.. i can see this added to the bill in a few weeks…

  44. This makes sense. Anything in the name of public safety, if it saves even 1 life.

  45. The cops probably won’t care much about this law. The ammo will just be super expensive. They don’t pay that bill so why would they care?

    Now retired cops. That’s who will scream.

    The intent is not to track ammo sales. It’s to kill gun use. They can’t ban all guns so now they attack ammo

    A gun is of no useful value without ammo. The courts need to rule on these kinds of laws

  47. Shall not be infringed says it all. Ban arrows, slingshots, zip guns and how about explosives. Liberals live in a utopia of lies that only serve there interests while trying to make themselves look good. Their constant cyclical reasoning is so obvious. Oh look what we’ve done you can’t make it without us. Actually nothing the liberals have done will deter crimes. They know it. They just want you to be more dependent on them. Which is why they love open borders. The media plays this crap and people come here and parrot what they’ve already heard. Some people cannot think for themselves they need to continually be told what to rant against to feel useful. Nothing new here. How can liberals promise safety through these constant barrages of stupid gun laws? They can’t. Some people will always find a way to commit a crime no matter what. They will just use a knife instead. Been in a knife fight lately? Makes it a lot harder for woman and weaker people to defend themselves. People will bleed out quicker and die faster. Liberals built that.

  48. So we can forgive criminals by legalizing a product (cannabis) and criminalize law-abiding citizens by enacting laws against previously obtained legal products (ammo)? Crazy.

    Stock up on reloading supplies, I guess.

    • “…and criminalize law-abiding citizens by enacting laws against previously obtained legal products (ammo)? Crazy.”

      Nope. Ops normal. Once upon a time, cocaine was a legal product. Then one day the product became illegal for possession without a prescription (controlled drug). The law did not make people who possessed/bought cocaine prior to the effective date of the law, you were breaking the law if you possessed it (without prescription) on, or after, the effective date of the law. People possessing/using cocaine prior to the law were not guilty of breaking the law before it was implemented (which is the essence of ex post facto).

  49. These gun control IDIOTS COULD PULL THERE HEAD OUT OF THERE ASSES AND WOULD NOT SEE DAYLIGHT FOR A THOUSAND YEARS. I am so sick of the bullshit, the laws they pass don’t apply to criminals, rich people & politicians.

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