2A Newsletter: Week of January 27th

Biden Administration Reintroduces Slew of Gun "Safety" Bills

In a brief statement this Monday, Biden announced Senator Diane Feinstein’s latest proposed version of an “assault” weapons ban. In addition to this, the premier anti-gunners in Congress want to ban standard capacity magazines on a federal level which is why a new bill to do so has also been raised in the Senate. Their reasoning; to make America safer and reduce gun violence. 

(Friendly reminder that if you’re a gun guy or gal we say ‘standard capacity’ because these were the original manufacturer’s intended design - what the gun control crowd considers as “standard” we call “low capacity.”)

It needs to be understood by more people that the demand for “commonsense gun laws” is simply the road to mass disarmament, which history has shown, lead to severe and irreparable injustice.

Of course, we focus on the topic of gun rights because that is our industry. But it points to a larger issue at hand which is the alarming increase of encroaching power and control that the United States’ central government seems hellbent on pushing for.

For your friends that are anti-gun or naysayers, offer them some of these challenges: Why does “prepping,” regardless if it’s for guns or for people canning their own food, have a stigma tied to it? How much trash is actually being recycled in America vs being shipped off to other countries? Why is the traditional family model being attacked? Why does the political divide among citizens seem greater than it ever has been before in American history?

Also, when is it enough? At what point do advocates of pro gun control feel that enough has been done? Imagine there was no opposition to any of their proposed laws, where is the line? Does it even exist? What is the point of gun control, is it actually to save lives or is to push a different agenda?

As one delves deeper into the world of guns and gun rights advocacy, it kind of becomes a huge and easily overwhelming civics lesson that is often not taught in most schools. The dichotomy between people’s values in our society today is why it’s called a culture war and we’d all do well to be more educated and aware of what’s going on around us.

YouTube Policies Up the Ante Against Firearms Content

Photo Source: YouTube

In the past year we’ve seen more GunTubers move their content from the traditional YouTube/Instagram platforms to more open and less censored streaming platforms in order to continue publishing their firearms content creation. In terms of video streaming, Odysee and Rumble are growing favorites. (We’ve also begun posting video content to Odysee that was previously removed by YouTube). Some GunTubers opt for Patreon to petition their subscribers and fans to directly support their content that way. Companies like T-REX Arms still post to YouTube but will post videos directly on their website or exclusively on their newsletter emails.

Now, YouTube has updated their policy for its algorithm to essentially censor any content using suppressors. The video streaming giant, now owned by Google, is also applying strikes to channels when it detects more than 30 shots in one string of fire. Is that an arbitrary number or was it a deliberate decision? Hmmm… This new policy is being applied to videos published months or even years ago.

Forget about even monetization. If YouTubers receive three strikes within a 90 day period they are at risk of losing their channel and ability to use the platform forever. It’s not just influencers in the gun industry, many companies and educational challenges are currently facing the same predicament.

Firearm accessories have often been targeted in recent years of gun control legislation. Unfortunately, suppressors have not been immune to that. Part of the issue is that while some really cool action movies and tv shows have come out in recent years, some of their depictions of firearms and their use have only gone on to hurt the gun industry with politicians being wrongly informed by Hollywood entertainment (cue the One World Trade Center fight scene with suppressed pistols in John Wick 2).

For anyone who has actually used a suppressor before you’d know that suppressors are great for hearing safety, not necessarily easy to use as you need to tune your rifle to cycle reliably and consistently. Despite how much noise is being suppressed from the can, the “thwack” from your bolt carrier group going back and forth is still pretty loud. You can see a lot of this from the NFA Review Channel on YouTube. It’s definitely not a “fwip” or “psh” sound as the movies make it seem like. Don’t let anti-gunners demonize NFA items, they’re regulated enough as it is.

Tennessee Loses Lawsuit - 18-20 Year Olds Can Now Carry Guns

Photo Source: Jamie Carroll via Shutterstock

It’s always nice to see FPC get another 2A win — Young adults in the Volunteer State are going to be able to start carrying guns the same way those the age of 21 years old and above. In the final court order, the judge decided that barring 18-20 year olds from carrying handguns or obtaining permits to do so was a violation of the Second and Fourteenth Amendments. What’s more, the state is also being forced to pay the Firearm Policy Coalition group’s legal fees. (Nice) The order for the Beeler v. Long case had gone into effect this Monday, January 23rd, 2023.

SHOT Show Review - ATF Show NFA Backlog Numbers

Photo Source: Ammoland News 

In last week’s newsletter we discussed the precarious nature of the ATF’s most recent flip flop and ploy to ban stabilizing braces. At this point, we hope that it is generally understood that this precarious situation is dangerous to say the least. Your actual options? Civil disobedience is an option, even if it means leaving your pistol braced build at home. Before this we would’ve said that registering your gun as an SBR was truly a viable option.

The problem is directly related to what we referred to last week — and that’s the ATF’s incentive to get people to register their new “SBR’s.” From 2021R-08’s final version publish date, a 120 day clock countdown started for the ATF’s grace period given to gun owners to decide which direction they’d like to go. Incoming lawsuits against the ATF aside, what if you apply for an SBR tax stamp and over 120 days have passed? The ATF and their limited staff will likely not be able to process everyone’s applications in time. What will you do then? At no fault of your own, in this situation you’d be in clear violation of the ATF rule and what’s worse you’d be a felon.

To provide some contextual evidence to all of this, while our team was not able to attend SHOT Show this year, in an ATF presentation some NFA numbers were shown that present how many pending tax stamps were pending in being fulfilled. As of 1/10/2023 that number was 298,468…

In the great words of Admiral Ackbar, “IT’S A TRAP!”

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