When Defense Distributed first unveiled its Liberator model, it was kind of a special moment in the world of the Second Amendment. It was suddenly clear that you couldn’t stop the signal, and that gun control’s last hopes of stopping people from getting guns were over.
Yes, that’s a good thing.
Now, tons of people are using 3D printers to make their own guns. The Liberator is far from the only model available, and options range from a Glock-style lower receiver to full gun builds like the FGC-9.
And so the jihad against gun rights must expand if they’re to keep the illusion of control.
A bill has been filed in California that would ban the sale and transfer of 3D printers unless they’re listed on a state roster certifying that they block guns from being printed, and makes it illegal to disable or uninstall the blocking technology: https://t.co/Cu6qDXgdOK pic.twitter.com/8M4xzGtbL0
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) February 18, 2026
Now, this isn’t new. Other states have either done it or considered doing it.
The problem is, as I noted earlier this week, is that this ignores technical realities.
For one thing, some parts are kind of generic and are used for both guns and other products that aren’t firearms at all. How deep will these algorithms be able to go in telling the difference? Further, most such algorithms depend on exact parameters for the part. Even a simple cosmetic change would be enough to bypass the controls these laws demand.
And for what?
In a piece I wrote on Wednesday, I covered a “study” that tried to link privately made firearms with suicides. That entire study was, for the most part, terribly flawed at best, especially as it only focused on a single state. That study did find that there was no statistically significant impact on homicides with privately made firearms, though, and that is significant.
After all, the only state they looked at was California.
That’s right, we already know that while the doomsaying from the media has been that “ghost gun” recoveries are skyrocketing, they still only account for a small percentage of the guns in criminal hands, at most.
So what California is trying to do here, ostensibly to curtail the private manufacturing of firearms, won’t have any appreciable difference in the crime rate. It’ll only make it more of a pain in the butt for people who are into 3D printing.
Meanwhile, the criminals who want to make their own guns or make guns for sale will just drive across the border, buy a 3D printer somewhere else, bring it home, and hook it up so they can get to work.
Or someone with time on their hands and hacking skills in their head will jailbreak it just for the fun of it, post it only to show they did it–hackers do that to prove they can do it–and then everything the law is trying to do will turn out to be a big old waste of time, money, and resources with nothing to show for it.
Just like every other gun control effort California has tried over the years.
Editor’s Note: The radical left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.
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