Today, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) rule regulating the parts kits used to build ghost guns. Writing for the 7-2 majority in Bondi v. VanDerStok, Justice Gorsuch concluded that the 1968 Gun Control Act “embraces, and thus permits ATF to regulate, some weapon parts kits and unfinished frames or receivers” that can be used to construct firearms.
Since it took effect in August 2022, the ATF’s “frame and receiver” rule has required that gun-building kits must be sold with serial numbers and background checks like complete firearms, making it more difficult for people prohibited from owning firearms, including people with felony convictions and minors, to buy unserialized, and thus untraceable, gun-building kits online.
ghost guns: A threat to public safety
Congress enacted the Gun Control Act (GCA) of 1968 to prevent people from buying mail-order guns like the rifle used in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, Jr. The law requires that licensed gun makers imprint serial numbers on their guns, and that gun dealers record those serial numbers in their transaction records so police can trace the gun back to its original purchaser if it’s ever recovered at a crime scene.
The GCA defines a “firearm” as any weapon “which will or is designed to or may readily be converted to expel a projectile by the action of an explosive,” as well as “the frame or receiver of any such weapon.” But in recent years, a number of retailers skirted the GCA’s requirements by selling nearly complete frames and receivers — the core building blocks of handguns and long guns, respectively — along with jigs, drill bits, and instructions for completing them in minutes. The retailers alleged that these kits were not firearms, and thus did not require serial numbers or background checks on buyers.
Predictably, ghost guns quickly became weapons of choice for criminals. According to the ATF, police recovered 92,702 ghost guns between 2017 and 2023.
the supreme court’s opinion
In the majority opinion, Justice Gorsuch examined Polymer80’s so-called “80-percent”-complete pistol frames as a way of showing that ghost guns should still be regulated like commercially made firearms: “Imagine a handgun that is otherwise ready to shoot, but contains Polymer80’s incomplete frame. An ordinary person, using ordinary tools, can finish the frame in minutes.”
Gorsuch also included a photo of a “Glock-variant” frame and a Polymer80 frame, noting that the “main differences between the completed frame and Polymer80’s product are the plastic tabs circled in red,” which are “are easily removable by a person with novice skill, using common tools…within minutes.”
Gorsuch wrote, “Recall the author who refers to her manuscript as a novel, or your friend who calls his IKEA kit a table. In much the same way, an ordinary speaker might well call Polymer80’s product a firearm ‘frame,’ even though a little work is required to complete it. Just look again at the…photo. What else would you call it?”
the atf rule is working
The ATF rule clarifies that “parts kits that are readily convertible to functional weapons, or functional ‘frames’ or ‘receivers’ of weapons, are subject to the same regulations as traditional firearms” and must be sold with serial numbers and background checks. Evidence suggests that the ATF rule is working in conjunction with state laws regulating ghost guns and litigation against retailers — like Polymer80, which shut down. For example:
- A study by the Everytown for Gun Safety Support Fund analyzing crime gun recoveries in 34 U.S. cities from 2019 to 2023 found that Polymer80 ghost gun recoveries dropped by 28 percent in 2023 — the first decrease since 2019.
- From 2019 to 2021, the number of ghost guns recovered from all crime scenes in California increased by 592 percent. But from 2021 to 2023, the state actually saw a 28-percent decrease in ghost gun recoveries due in part to California’s ghost gun regulations, litigation, and the ATF rule.
- New Jersey also reported a decline in ghost gun recoveries in 2023 — as have several large cities, including New York City, Baltimore, Boston, San Francisco, Philadelphia, and Oakland. Recent data shows that Los Angeles alone has seen a 50-percent drop in ghost gun recoveries since 2022.