Traditions Firearms Serial Number Lookup

[Nickie Koskinen]

Thatchanges today. This rule will make it harder for criminals and other prohibited persons to obtain untraceable guns. It will help to ensure that law enforcement officers can retrieve the information they need to solve crimes. And it will help reduce the number of untraceable firearms flooding our communities. I am grateful to the professionals across the Department who worked tirelessly to get this important rule finalized and implemented, and who did so in a way that respects the rights of law-abiding Americans.

As the final rule explains, from January 2016 to December 2021, ATF received approximately 45,240 reports of suspected PMFs recovered by law enforcement, including in 692 homicide or attempted homicide investigations.

The Justice Department issued the following statement from Attorney General Merrick B. Garland on the arrests of alleged leaders of the Sinaloa Cartel, Ismael Zambada Garcia (El Mayo) and Joaquin Guzman Lopez:

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Conservation Education/Firearms Safety courses are administered by the Department of Energy and Environmental Protection's Wildlife Division and are taught throughout the year by a dedicated corps of certified volunteer instructors. Certifications are offered in the disciplines of Firearms Hunting, Bowhunting, and Trapping. Please note: Course registration is limited to a pre-determined number of students for each location.

Self-Study Firearms Hunter Safety - This course requires students to first complete one of two approved online firearms hunter education courses before attending a full day of in-person instruction, covering classroom material and field exercises.

Basic and Land Trapping - This in-person course consists of a full day of instruction, including classroom materials and field exercises. Graduates will receive both the Basic Trapping certification and Land Trapping Certification, allowing the purchase of a trapping license and those with a valid trapping license to participate in the coyote land trapping certification.

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While the United States continues to grapple with a solution to gun violence following mass shootings in Buffalo and Uvalde, lawmakers at the state and federal level have recently enacted laws that highlight another dangerous factor at play: ghost guns.

Because they are sold as kits, ghost guns are accessible and enticing to those who cannot otherwise obtain a firearm due to their inability to pass a background check, either for their age or for previous offenses. And because they come in a kit, they do not currently require a serial number, as they're not a completed frame. Those who are not legally able to obtain a firearm don't break the law by purchasing the kit; they only break the law when they have a completed firearm put together.

Federal lawmakers recently enacted a rule that requires serial numbers for all ghost gun kits, and requires the kits to be treated as a traditional firearm, even before the gun is put together. Slated to go into effect later this year, the rule allows the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, or ATF, to regulate ghost guns and ghost gun kits as they would traditional firearms. At the state level, Maryland lawmakers recently enacted a law which prohibits anyone from buying, selling, or transferring an unfinished firearm frame without a serial number. Maryland is the 10th state in the country, in addition to the District of Columbia, to regulate ghost guns.

These new bills come at a time when ghost guns are becoming an increasingly larger issue in the country's fight against gun violence, something Alexander McCourt, assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and director of legal research at the Center for Gun Violence Solutions, knows all too well.

"From the data we have, we see ghost guns exploding in popularity," McCourt says. "The ATF shared earlier this year that they had made about 24,000 attempts to trace a privately made firearm or ghost gun, and they only succeeded 151 times. These are very, very difficult to trace. The number recovered is getting larger and larger and is on track to increase this year."

We've tried to push for more transparency with respect to the data; we want law enforcement agencies to be reporting as much as possible about the guns they recover. That's also true at the federal level, where the general data we do have is difficult to get to, it's not very transparent, and that's even more difficult when it comes to guns that are virtually untraceable.

This is something states have struggled with, because this is a very online phenomenon. If New Jersey has a law, how do they keep their residents from ordering something online? It's difficult, and that's why the new federal rule from the ATF, which should go into place later this year, will make it so that only licensed manufacturers can sell these kits to licensed dealers, and the kits will be required to have a serial number. Basically, what it does is it takes these kits and these pieces and brings them in line with all other types of guns. Ideally the new rule will work in concert with these state laws, making it easier for states to identify these guns that don't have serial numbers, and they can limit the number that are present in the state.

A common complaint is that these rules are too restrictive for hobbyists, or that these rules and laws violate the Second Amendment. There's no Second Amendment issue here. All this does is bring these pieces and kits in line with how we regulate every other gun in the U.S. There's nothing that stops a hobbyist from making homemade guns; if the next step now is that they have to undergo a background check to buy a kit or pieces, a hobbyist has likely already undergone a background check for buying another gun, so it's not really a big hurdle.

The main goal with regulating ghost guns is limiting access for people who have a history of domestic violence or are a risk to themselves, and to prevent children from getting guns. These rules aren't intended to target hobbyists.

I think we're definitely going to see litigation related to the ATF rule. It will be interesting to see how that plays out, and also how a future administration might modify enforcement of that rule. Are they going to enforce it differently or are they going to alter it? Those things will be important, and it'll also be interesting to see how states continue to expand their regulation of ghost guns in ways the federal government can't, such as monitoring private transfers or requiring the addition of serial numbers to homemade guns.

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Donation to Veterans' Organizations

Public Law 80-421 (U.S.C. 2572) authorizes the Secretaries of the Military Departments to donate or loan certain types of surplus military equipment to recognized, selected recipients. The following organizations are authorized to acquire, through donation or loan, obsolete or condemned combat material, books, manuscripts, works of art, drawings, plans and models for historical, ceremonial and display purposes: Veterans organizations. Requests for loan or donation of property submitted by posts or local units of recognized veterans' organizations shall include the written approval of their national headquarters, if they are organized in that manner. Soldiers Monument Associations State Museums Incorporated Museums Municipal Museums Sons of Veterans Reserves

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