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Federal judge strikes down ATF rule treating 3D-printed gun part kits as firearms, citing Fifth Amendment and historical gunsmithing tradition
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Judge Reed O'Connor of the Northern District of Texas ruled that the ATF's 2022 rule classifying readily convertible parts kits as firearms is unconstitutional, finding it violates the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment and contradicts the historical tradition of personal gunsmithing.
The ruling removes, at least temporarily, federal background-check and serial-number requirements for parts kits that can be assembled into functional firearms. The decision is expected to be appealed to the Fifth Circuit and may return to the Supreme Court, which previously upheld the rule on statutory grounds but explicitly left constitutional questions open.
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The ATF's 2022 rule required retailers to run background checks on parts kit purchasers, defined what constitutes a firearm frame or receiver, and mandated serial numbers on 3D-printed and non-serialized firearms.
Judge O'Connor ruled the rule was unconstitutionally vague under the Due Process Clause and that restrictions on self-built arms lack historical precedent, citing no such restrictions existed in seventeenth-, eighteenth-, or nineteenth-century America.
The Supreme Court previously upheld the ATF regulation in a 7-2 vote on statutory authority grounds, but Justice Gorsuch noted that future cases may present more difficult constitutional questions.
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