Gun control is a bad idea no matter how you slice it, but there’s something inherently worse about bureaucrats trying to create it out of the ether. That’s much of what the Cargill decision was about.

Yet that decision was pretty limited. The ATF got his wrist slapped for creating a whole new definition of what a machine gun is, not for trying to regulate things in general. With the death of the Chevron deference, well, things now can get a little more spicy. However, that’s still not an end to what all anti-gun bureaucrats can do to American gun owners.

Just look at what they did with pistol braces. They arbitrarily decided that no, those are illegal because someone can use one to shoulder a short-barreled rifle despite the fact that someone actually could do so without a brace, it just wouldn’t be particularly comfortable. This change, however, threatened a lot of people. They had to either get rid of an accessory they bought in good faith or face becoming felons.

I’m not a fan of that kind of thing, nor any of the other anti-gun shenanigans.

Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks of Iowa isn’t a fan of what’s been happening, either.

Our Constitution’s framers affirmed our right to bear arms through the Second Amendment for an important reason; to provide Americans with means of protection and self-defense. They made this very clear when they wrote “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

Unfortunately, the Biden Administration has chosen to disregard this principle on which our nation was founded by attempting to impose some of the strictest gun laws in American history.

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On January 31, 2023, Biden’s unelected bureaucrats at the ATF published their final rule 2021R08F, “Factoring Criteria for Firearms with Attached Stabilizing Braces.”

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Lawful gun owners could have faced up to 10 years in federal prison, become felons, and received a $250,000 fine for having a stabilizing brace on their lawfully-purchased firearm.

I cosponsored legislation that passed the House to protect millions of gun owners by nullifying this blatantly unconstitutional pistol brace ban rule.

Miller-Meeks is running for reelection, so much of this is campaign rah-rah, but it’s a good reminder that the Biden administration has been hard at work redefining things and trying to use the administrative state to attack your right to keep and bear arms.

The truth is that the administrative state has no business making laws at all, particularly when they restrict people’s rights.

I don’t like legislatures passing gun control and other infringements on our civil liberties, but those are at least people who were elected and can be removed. It’s still wrong, but at least it’s something we the people can address directly.

Bureaucrats are the single greatest threat to freedom in this country simply because they’re unaccountable. We can’t vote to remove an ATF employee who decided to make an accessory illegal. We don’t even really know who writes these things specifically, only that the ATF is churning out stupidity at an alarming rate. Yes, these things can be addressed by the White House, but that’s not how it should work. Those aren’t checks and balances by any stretch of the imagination.

Couple this with the other continued assaults on our rights from elected morons and we’ve got a real issue on our hands, one we have to figure out how to address.