On March 31, 2025, the San Francisco Chronicle sounded the alarm for the gun control lobby, warning that Biden’s “ghost gun” restrictions are “likely to be undone by President Donald Trump.”
The restrictions are contained in ATF Final Rule 2021-05F. A central part of this rule was redefining what the word “firearm” means so as to designate “partially completed pistol frames” and other gun parts as “firearms.”
Final Rule 2021-05F was upheld by the Supreme Court of the United States on March 26, 2025.
FPC LEGAL ALERT: The Supreme Court has upheld the ATF's "frame or receiver" rule. You can read the opinion here: https://t.co/qcBmmWGcBX pic.twitter.com/uMCAxV9gUq
— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) March 26, 2025
The San Francisco Chronicle reported, “President Joe Biden’s administration adopted regulations in 2022 requiring the parts to include serial numbers so that their owners could be traced. The regulations also required the buyers to undergo background checks, like those mandated for gun purchasers, and banned sales to anyone under age 21.”
The Chronicle suggests Trump has set the stage for a repeal of the “ghost gun” rule, noting, “Trump left ghost guns unregulated in his first term, and issued an executive order in February to ‘halt existing policies designed to curtail the clear right of law-abiding citizens to keep and bear arms.'”
Moreover, “[Trump] told Attorney General Pam Bondi to review the Biden administration’s gun regulations and ‘deliver a plan of action’ to remove unwarranted restrictions.”
One law professor told the Chronicle, “The Trump administration could easily, by executive order, rescind the ghost gun regulation.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly:
