The Biden administration has collected the records of more than 54 million U.S. gun owners. They are now planning to drastically alter gun regulations, Washington Free Beacon reports.
The ATF in fiscal year 2021 processed 54.7 million out-of-business records, according to an internal ATF document obtained by the Gun Owners of America.
When a licensed gun store goes out of business, its private records detailing gun transactions become ATF property and are stored at a federal site in West Virginia. This practice allows the federal government to stockpile scores of gun records.
The ATF obtained 53.8 million paper records and another 887,000 electronic records, according to the internal document that outlines ATF actions in fiscal year 2021.
Gun activists described this figure as worryingly high and said it contributes to fears that the Biden administration is trying to keep track of all Americans who own firearms, in violation of federal statutes.
“As if the addition of over 50 million records to an ATF gun registry wasn’t unconstitutional or illegal enough, the Biden administration’s misuse of ‘out-of-business’ records doesn’t end there,” Aidan Johnston, the Gun Owners of America’s director of federal affairs, told the Free Beacon. “Instead of maintaining the right of [licensed firearm dealers] to destroy Firearm Transaction Records after 20 years, buried within Biden’s proposed regulations is a provision that would mean every single Firearm Transaction Record going forward would eventually be sent to ATF’s registry in West Virginia.”
Gun grabbers have called to digitize these records and continue building a federal gun database.
The ATF has so many records stored in its West Virginia site that several years ago the floor collapsed, according to the New York Times.
An ATF spokesman declined to comment on internal agency records but told the Free Beacon that the agency’s “National Tracing Center processes millions of out of business records each month.” However, “Those out-of-business records do not constitute an initiation or continuation of any federal gun registry,” an ATF spokesman said.
The ATF’s proposed regulations would also require gun parts to be regulated with background checks
Gun advocates, including the Gun Owners of America, accused the Biden administration of abusing the rule-making process to ensure these regulations are put into effect in record time, possibly before the end of the year.
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