Forget sensible gun safety legislation.
Beginning Wednesday, people with access to a 3D printer can download – free – the blueprints for a range of firearms, including AR-15s, and print their own functioning guns.
Without being subjected to background checks. Without traceable serial numbers. Without age requirements. Without registration.
Made of plastic, these aptly dubbed “ghost guns” are undetectable in airport, courthouse or other metal-detecting screens.
If you have the dough, you can buy your own 3D printer and make an arsenal. Hint: Small ones are advertised by Walmart for $199 or you can go all out for a few thousand dollars.
Who says America’s gun rights are or have ever been in jeopardy?
How did this happen? Ask the Trump State Department. But here’s the short version, according to pbs.org:
Self-described anarchist Cody Wilson in 2013 made and fired the first 3D-printed gun and posted the printing manual for the gun – he called it “the Liberator” – online. His software code was downloaded more than 100,000 times in the span of a few days, before the federal government ordered him to remove the instructions. He took down the post, but two years later filed a lawsuit against the U.S. State Department in federal court.
The Obama State Department said online 3D gun instructions posed a national security risk and violated the International Traffic in Arms Regulations export laws. Wilson argued the government was violating his constitutional rights to free speech and bear arms.
Last month, despite the fact that the government had prevailed in court at every step, the Trump State Department agreed to a settlement with Wilson’s nonprofit company, Texas-based Defense Distributed. The settlement not only allows Wilson to publish the gun blueprints online, but also agreed to pay Wilson’s nearly $40,000 legal fees.
Avery Gardiner, co-president of the Brady Campaign and Center to Prevent Gun Violence, told PBS, “It’s very odd for the government to have won all steps in the case so far and then do such an about face.”
Last week, the Brady Center, along with Everytown for Gun Safety and Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, joined in a last-minute effort to block the Trump administration’s settlement, but on Friday a federal judge in Texas dismissed their bid.
Now Wilson plans to post software plans – free for the download – for his single-shot pistol and a variety of other firearms, including AR-10 and AR-15 style rifles.
What can be done? Not much by Wednesday.
America does have the Undetectable Firearms Act of 1988, a federal law making it illegal to “manufacture, import, sell, ship, deliver, possess, transfer, or receive” firearms that can’t be detected by metal detectors. Congress extended the law in 2013, but did not update it to account for 3D-printing technology – like requiring weapons to contain at least one necessary component that’s easily detectable. As is, according to pbs.org, the law doesn’t stipulate what parts of the gun must be metal, and so it could be an immaterial component that, once removed, would leave the gun operable and undetected.
Andrew J. McClurg, a professor of law at the University of Memphis who specializes in firearms policy, told PBS that the panic over 3D-printed gun instructions online is “much ado about nothing in the big picture.”
“For every person killed with 3D-printed guns, there will be probably five people shot in Memphis that night with real guns. While we’re paying attention to this novelty item, we’re doing an injustice to the bigger picture and bigger cause.”
Really? How long do we think it will take for these “ghost guns” to be the hottest item in any pocket or holster on a Memphis street?
Some states – New Jersey and California – have passed legislation aimed at regulating 3D-printed guns, and U.S. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer is demanding the government reverse its June decision. Five other Democratic senators asked Attorney General Jeff Sessions to explain the settlement decision.
But here’s a bet.
Any intervention or reversal won’t come as a result of political pressure – especially not from our majority GOP Congress and state houses.
On the contrary, the trigger for stopping this nightmare more likely will be pulled by the big gun manufacturers like Tennessee’s Barrett and Beretta, or by the gunmakers’ de facto trade group, the National Rifle Association. Those are the folks who may come to fear an even greater “Trump slump” in traditional gun sales, especially in light Remington’s March filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection.
That might get lawmakers’ attention because they clearly know better than to get between gunmakers, the NRA and a bank.