‘Ghost Guns’ Ruling Is a Pointless Attack on Second Amendment Rights

"Ghost guns" seized in federal law enforcement actions are displayed at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) field office in Glendale, Calif., on April 18, 2022. Robyn Beck/AFP via Getty Images

Commentary

The term “ghost guns” is an outrageously inaccurate, but effective, epithet against American’s Second Amendment right “to keep and bear arms.” It just means home-made guns, which are become easier than ever to make due to continuous improvements in 3D printing.

The latest development for these guns came in California on May 30, when Los Angeles City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto on her website “announced a settlement in the Office’s lawsuit against Nevada-based Polymer80, permanently prohibiting the company from selling its ghost gun kits in California without first conducting background checks of buyers and without utilizing serial numbers on its products. The company must also pay $4 million in civil penalties, and its two founders must pay an additional $1 million in civil penalties.”

“Polymer80 is the nation’s largest producer of ghost gun kits and component parts, which enable buyers to assemble fully functioning untraceable guns at home in an hour or less. From Jan. 2020 through Feb. 2, 2023, LAPD recovered more than 4,200 Polymer80 ghost guns. The national organization Everytown for Gun Safety has called ghost guns the fastest-growing gun safety problem facing our nation,” the announcement read.

And notice how it next elides into overall gun violence, not just that from “ghost guns,” when quoting her directly:

“More than 16,000 people have been killed by gun violence so far in 2023. This [the Polymer80 settlement] is an important step toward preventing unnecessary deaths, especially as Congress repeatedly fails to take action.”

That’s throughout the whole United States. And it doesn’t note how, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, 54 percent of gun homicides in America are suicides. Regrettable, certainly. But should we ban bridges because people jump off of them to kill themselves?

President Joe Biden holds up a ghost gun kit during an event at the White House in Washington on April 11, 2022. Mandel Ngan/AFP via Getty Images

Fake Gun Scare

America’s top gun scholar, John Lott, earlier in May co-wrote an article with Ira Hansen and Jeff Stone, two state senators in Nevada, which is working on a “ghost gun” law. It rebuts the whole “ghost guns” scare, beginning with the bugaboo about “serial numbers”:

“Democrats have pushed for these serial numbers, saying it will help prevent violent crime. ‘(Serial numbers) will help to ensure that law enforcement officers can retrieve the information they need to solve crimes,’ U.S. Attorney General Merrick Garland claimed last August.

“Homemade guns have existed since even before the United States became a country, and it was never terribly difficult to make a gun with simple machine tools. But now their production has become nearly impossible to regulate. With 3-D metal printers, people can now make firearms that are indistinguishable from those purchased in stores.

“And despite what people see on TV shows such as ‘Law & Order,’ serial numbers on guns don’t help law enforcement solve crimes.”

They note guns are almost never left behind by perpetrators, except when the user himself is wounded or killed. Criminals also commonly use untraceable regular guns. “Police in jurisdictions from Hawaii to Chicago to Pennsylvania to New York have had registration for decades yet can’t point to any crimes they have been able to solve with it.”

The authors say the “ghost guns” registration scheme is just to advance a Canada- or Australia-style national gun registry, which the Biden administration already is doing illicitly. Lott has detailed this in another article, pointing out the move is just a precursor, as in those two countries, to near-total gun-confiscation.

But it’s too late. Like your iPhone, every year 3D technology just keeps getting better. Some stories:

• Daily Express: “3D printed weapons in UK becoming an issue ‘faster than expected.’” Even though almost all guns are prohibited there.
• 3DPrint.com: “3D Printed Guns Are Getting Better, Legal Debate Still Lingering in the US.”
• Euronews: “Experts say virtually anyone can now make a firearm, with materials and instructions readily available online.”

The controversy reminds me of how the Soviet Union required the registration of copier technology, because they correctly feared dissidents would use it for “samizdat” (self-published) documents criticizing the communist regime. Typewriters also were registered. Both devices leave unique “fingerprints” on their products, basically micro-lines on the copier or typeface. Copiers even were kept under lock-and-key until 1989, as the Berlin Wall fell and the whole communist edifice of repression and murder began falling apart like a cheap card table.

East Berliners climb onto the Berlin Wall to celebrate the effective end of the city's partition, Dec. 31, 1989. Steve Eason/Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Conclusion

While the “ghost guns” scare is pointless, it does have one effect: Advancing political careers. The L.A. witch hunt began in 2021 under then-City Attorney Mike Feuer, who was launching a bid to become the mayor. He dropped out just before last year’s June primary after polls showed he barely registered with just 3 percent of voters, endorsing eventual winner Karen Bass. His “ghost guns” ploy didn’t help his ghost campaign.

It’s too bad Polymer80 didn’t continue their lawsuit. A year ago the U.S. Supreme Court handed down the Bruen decision, affirming the Second Amendment right not only to own a gun, but of concealed carry.

All of our rights must be defended, or soon we’ll end up with none.

John Seiler’s email: [email protected]

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.