The Supreme Court has struck down a federal Trump-era ban on bump stock sales

The U.S. Supreme Court overturned the Trump-era federal ban on bump stocks, finding that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives exceeded its authority by banning the devices. The vote was 6 to 3, with three liberals on the Court expressing their angry opposition.

President Trump ordered the ban in 2017 after one gunman at a Las Vegas concert used multiple weapons modified with magazines to kill 60 people and injure 400 — all in 11 minutes. A subsequent ATF regulation banned stockpiles on the grounds that they converted legal semi-automatic weapons into illegal machine guns. But on Friday, the Supreme Court’s conservative majority struck down the law.

Writing for the court, Justice Clarence Thomas said a semi-automatic rifle fitted with a stock was not a “machine gun” because it did not fire automatically. Reinforcing his opinion with six diagrams illustrating how the stockpile works, Thomas noted that the ATF regulation was a reversal of the agency’s previous position.

In a concurring opinion, Justice Samuel Alito acknowledged that “the Congress that enacted” the 1986 law at issue “would have recognized no significant difference between a machine gun and a semi-automatic rifle equipped with a stock.” But he said the statute’s provisions do not allow for such a ban and only Congress can change it.

Writing on behalf of the dissenters, Justice Sonia Sotomayor accused the conservative majority of once again turning a blind eye to the reality of gun violence and making it even more difficult to pass measures to prevent bloodshed.

The dispute between the majority and the dissent concerned how the stock-modified weapon operated. Joseph Blocher, co-director of the Duke Center for Firearms Law, explains that with a stock, the shooter places his finger on the stock rest and pushes the stock forward. “What the stock basically does is deflect the gun,” he says. “It’s hitting back and forth with the trigger finger. So as long as you hold your finger and the stock works, it will fire on its own. So functionally it’s a machine gun and no one seems to agree with that.”

However, Justice Thomas, speaking for the majority, said the surplus did not change the situation internal trigger mechanism, therefore it cannot be classified as an illegal machine gun.

Justice Sotomayor In a rare oral dissent, the jury called it “shortsighted” to “focus” on the gun’s internal functions rather than the rapid-fire function added by the stock, a mechanism that allows the shooter to fire as many as 800 rounds per minute. Sotomayor concluded: “When I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck.”

The decision was a bitter disappointment for gun control advocates. Kari Kuefler, who survived the Las Vegas shooting with her three-month-old child, broke down in tears on Friday as she talked about the Supreme Court’s decision and its consequences.

“People are already struggling to find safe spaces, from homes to churches to schools to workplaces,” she said. “Where are we going?” she asked. “We need to know that our government is fighting to get it back for us.”

UCLA law professor Adam Winkler sees Friday’s decision as part and parcel of the Supreme Court’s aversion to general agency rules. “It’s just another shot in the gut,” he says, adding that other gun control laws could soon be struck down, making it “much more difficult” for the ATF to regulate guns.

The White House knows it too. On Friday, President Biden quickly called on Congress to pass a ban on bump actions, but the prospects for doing so are unclear at best given the continued gridlock today. And the gun lobby is very strategic about combating these drugs, notes Winkler of UCLA, author of the book Shooting: The battle for the right to bear arms in America.

“This decision demonstrates the success of the national regulator’s long-term strategy to combat gun control,” he notes. “After the Las Vegas massacre, the Trump administration and members of Congress came close to passing new legislation banning bump stocks. “The National Regulatory Authority intervened, pressing the Trump administration to instead ban bump actions through regulation of administrative agencies.”

He says the NRA assumed that, given the current Supreme Court’s hostility to agency regulations, the court would eventually lift the ban on bump stocks. It turned out to be a good bet.