Joe Biden, Kamala Harris, Merrick Garland
President Joe Biden gestures as he speaks about gun violence prevention in the Rose Garden at the White House. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)

It’s no secret that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) under President Joe Biden has targeted firearms retailers, constantly claiming that “rogue gun dealers” are fueling violent crime. In fact, the administration has painted gun dealers as enemies of America.

With Biden’s so-called “zero-tolerance” policy for even minor paperwork errors, the ATF has forced hundreds of dealers out of business in the past few years, and prodded others to give up their licenses instead of facing a hearing.

A recent report from ATF showed that in 2023 the ATF revoked 157 federal firearms licenses following an inspection, nearly twice as many as the 88 licenses revoked in 2022. In the last six months of 2021, before the “zero-tolerance” policy, only five licenses were revoked.

In response to this atrocity, U.S. Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, has introduced a measure to curb this misuse of power. Her bill is titled “Fighting Irrational Regulatory Enforcement to Avert Retailers’ Misfortune (FIREARM) Act.”

“Biden’s ATF has had it out for gun owners since day one,” Ernst said upon introduction of the measure. “For years, the Biden administration has cracked down on law-abiding gun dealers to advance its gun-grabbing agenda, even preventing small businesses from making a living. Rather than helping dealers comply with the law, Biden’s ATF has created more hurdles to legally sell guns, so it can turn around and revoke licenses for inconsequential so-called ‘violations.’”

The measure creates a safe harbor for FFLs to self-report violations, so they can correct any accidental errors; requires the ATF to work collaboratively with FFLs to fix violations and help avoid future violations; addresses the “willfulness” issue by defining it to mean a voluntary, intentional violation of a known legal duty achieved through specific intent or deliberate planning, excludes previous conduct, and creates a rebuttal if the conduct is not willful; and allows for direct judicial review of license revocations to avoid the ATF from serving as both the judge and prosecutor.

Rep. Darryl Issa, R-California, has introduced a companion bill in the U.S. House of Representatives.

“From the beginning, this administration has sought to undermine the Second Amendment and weaponize federal agencies against law-abiding citizens and family-owned small businesses targeted for being a part of the lawful firearms industry,” Issa said in a statement. “This has delivered a transparently unfair assault on the fundamental rights of our fellow Americans, and that’s why my friend Senator Ernst and I are introducing the FIREARM Act. It’s time to stop this abuse of power and prevent it from ever happening again.”

Introduction of the measure was met with favor by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the trade association for the firearms industry.

“Senator Joni Ernst’s ‘FIREARM’ Act will help restore confidence that ATF will fulfill its mission as a regulatory agency over the manufacture and sale of firearms rather than being used as a political tool by special interests,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF senior vice president and general counsel. “Under the Biden administration, the firearm and ammunition industry has seen the ATF turned into a sledgehammer to carry out this administration’s extreme antigun policies. This damages the cooperative relationships between firearm retailers, who are on the frontline preventing illegal straw purchases of firearms, and the ATF, who enforces laws to safeguard our communities. NSSF is thankful for Senator Ernst’s leadership to provide remedies that repair this necessary public trust in our federal agencies.”

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47 COMMENTS

  1. The ATF is an out of control agency, but the best way to protect gun dealers is to vote the geezer out of office.

    • Hopefully the S. Ct. will roll back the Chevron Doctrine and stop legislation by regulation, but we have to take reckless and unconstitutional power away from government entities.

    • NO, they are not out of control, they are doing what they are supposed to be doing as a domestic terrorist organization

    • Biden’s “AFT” is doing exactly as directed. Remember, for every FFL shutdown, the BATFE can scoop up all the 4473’s that are held by that former FFL.

    • Similar to other comments here, the ATF is doing exactly what the Executive Branch and Democrats want and is most certainly NOT out of control.

      As for these bills they are dead BEFORE arrival. Even if they manage to clear the U.S. House of Representatives (very doubtful), they will never get past the U.S. Senate’s rule requiring 60 U.S. Senators to agree to a full floor vote to actually vote whether or not to pass that proposed bill. (Yes, the U.S. Senate requires two actual votes to pass a bill–the first vote is a procedural vote whether or not to allow the bill to come to the floor to then vote whether or not the bill should become law.) Finally, even if those bills make it through the U.S. Senate by some miracle, Biden will veto them and there is absolutely positively NO WAY that Congress will get a 2/3rds majority to override Biden’s veto.

      I don’t know why anyone would even bother to propose such bills when there is less than zero chance of them passing. What a waste of time.

      • Exactly what I think too! This Senator is grandstanding to impress us, not to do anything meaningful. Politicians see us as a group to be manipulated, and that they can easily do that with these stunts. We know what the Dems will think and do. It is the Republicans who betray us.

      • They do this so that they can go out on the campaign trail and say “look, we’re on your side, really! Just look at all this wonderful legislation we woulda passed, if it weren’t for those rascally Democrats!”

        They know EXACTLY what they are doing. And so do the Democrats (who do the exact same thing but with different kinds of bills, designed to appeal to their constituents.)

      • I submit to you, sir, that the entire Biden administration is ‘out of control’ in that it is flaunting the Constitution and weaponizing as many agencies as it can against the American People.

  2. They should have called it the Free Ice Cream Act For Presidents Bill. I like the pushback from Ernst and Issa but this is going nowhere.

    • If only Joni Ernst would STOP following two steps behind the chinless one (Mitchie). Its rather embarrassing.

    • Well the Uncle Ben’s wannabe certainly was upset about his concocted charges hitting a roadblock…Upset like the tantrum throwing golden boy gadsten when I simply direct people to deals that save in the dog eat dog world of bidenomics.

      TRUMP 2024.

      • deb if you can’t say something nice then don’t say anything, and seeing as you never say anything nice STFU !!

  4. I knew nikki haley was not worth spit when she dropped to her knees and took down inanimate Historical Civil War era monuments and let stand Gun Control the alive and well symbol of Slavery, Genocide, etc. And it was not only nikki but millions of Gun owners who were just as silent. The kind of silence that causes a Senator to write a bill to protect citizens from Gun Control and the garbage it continues to produce.

    Make no mistake about it nikki and her vultures are circling around waiting for POTUS DJT to be stopped by concocted charges thinking people will flock to her…the batch, her ilk and the demented democRat Party have another thing coming.

    TRUMP 2024

  5. Y’know, when I first was reading Keith Laumer’s “Retief” stories, I thought the forced acronyms for legislation and programs was funny.

    Now, in real life, not so much. Less effort on the cutsie names, more on results, please.

    • Lil deb it makes me happy if I piss you off. No libel involved, every word is true, your history proves it. Harpie Karen I name thee. Fat, drunk and stupid is no way to go through life.

  9. The “Firearm” Act is a good idea; but, several commentators on another website, whom I will not name, have convinced me that Senator Joni Ernst is not exactly the best choice for getting this legislation passed. She has been described as someone who takes 2 steps forward and 1 backward thus opinions formed depends on when she is observed. This uncertainty attributed to her seems to mean that regardless she is always gaining a step forward and the step gained is not in the direction POTG desire or expect.

    • That place has some nice deals. Good thing I don’t live there. It’d be worse then living near the liquor store.
      Well anyway, thanx to the Greatest President America has or ever will have, Joseph Robinett Biden, I can’t afford booze no more either, or cigarettes. Golly gee due to the high price of things the system has lost out on those tax revenues now too.
      Priced out of buisness.
      What America needs to do is import Xhinese booze and cigarettes( I like the clove flavored ones and the packaging is prettier then U.S.brands), we are already getting the drugs, might as well as have the benefits of other addictions too.
      To Build Back Better you’ve got to tear it down. Joe is doing a hell of a good job of that.
      Biden 2024

    • They really need to try voting for Republicans who support civil rights. If they really care about keeping and getting more guns. Just having a gun doesn’t qualify you as a supporter of the 2A.

      And if they can find a Democrat??? Who really does support civil rights??? Then vote for him.

      • Name a time Republicans stood between government and Liberty by shrinking government authority?

        • Name a time when democrats supported the 1st amendment??? Or the Libertarians for that matter.

          Both of them are against christians protesting at abortion clinics. But they do support ant-war protests at military recruiting stations. And both supported the government stopping christians from attending Easter church services in 2020.

          Also the Libertarians nominated two, anti-civil rights candidates in 2016. For president and vice president.

          That is something the republicans have never done. But the democrats have. Now the libertarians are just like them.

  14. I like how these rino senators and representatives try to file bills when they don’t have a majority to pass anything in congress. When these rino senators and representatives had the majority several times over the last 25 years they did nothing to strengthen out 2A rights. Let’s see, 2 4 year terms under Bush with 8 years in the majority, 1 2 year term under Trump with 2 years in the majority. I think that was enough time for them to do something. It is all lip service to put a notch on their re-election campaign saying they tried to do something for us that really support the 2A.

    • “I like how these rino senators and representatives try to file bills when they don’t have a majority to pass anything in congress.”

      Politics is about fooling all the people, all the time.

  15. If this was about keeping p0r n0gr @phy vide0 stores and adult t0y stores open? There would be thousands of opinion pieces supporting it.

    • They should have shot those kids for resisting arrest. The cop said get out of the car and they just sat there.
      By gosh if it would have been the BATFE they would have.

  18. “As for these bills they are dead BEFORE arrival.” Yep. Waste of time, electrons and paper.

  20. A governmental agency manipulating the infringement of a Constitutional Right that declares Shall Not Be Infringed.
    And these people swore an oath to defend the Constitution.
    I’m confused.

  25. Why yes, there is a great fear. Of rural Christian people who have guns. I don’t understand why the big city @th eists and big city h 0 m 0 sex u#ls, would want to move to a more white, and more conservative part of the country????

    But Joe Rogan did just that???

  26. Feel good bs during an election year that won’t pass the senate without allowing a few more billion to line the pockets of the people profiting from the shadow wars.

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