Oral Arguments Heard Over Forced Reset Triggers

Last week, the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals heard oral arguments in the National Association For Gun Rights (NARG) v. Garland. The case centers on the legality of Forced Reset Triggers (FRT).

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) has been at war with Rare Breed Triggers over the legality of forced reset triggers for several years. Rare Breed makes the FRT-15 which is the most popular FRT trigger on the market. Another trigger ruled a knockoff of the FRT-15 by a Federal Court is the Wide Open Trigger (WOT), which was produced and sold by the now-defunct Big Daddy Unlimited (BDU). The ATF claims that these triggers are drop-in auto sears (DIAS) and turn a semi-automatic AR-15-style rifle into a machine gun. According to the National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA), any device that converts a semi-automatic firearm into a machine gun is considered itself to be a machine gun.

The ATF spent countless man-hours confiscating these devices from gun shops and the general public. After several failed legal challenges, Rare Breed Triggers teamed up with NAGR to sue the federal government in Texas over the devices. Texas falls under the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, which issued the bump stock ruling in Cargill that ruled that bump stocks were not machine guns. The Federal government appealed the ruling and went to the Supreme Court, where SCOTUS agreed with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.

In District Court, Judge Reed O’Connor ruled that the ATF overstepped their boundaries by declaring the Rare Breed FRT-15 and the WOT to be machine guns. He stated that these devices didn’t meet the statutory definition of a machine gun and ordered the ATF not only to stop enforcement action against sellers and gun owners but also to return the devices and send out a letter to the members of the organization correcting its mistake. He gave the ATF 30 days to comply, although they did get an extension. The final judgment also stripped the ATF of its power to enforce a FRT ban on anyone.

Lawyers of the Justice Department appealed the ruling to a panel of three judges at the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals but were facing an uphill battle. One of the key arguments is how Cargill applied to this case. In Cargill, the courts found that the trigger had to be pulled each time for a round to be expelled out of the firearm. That meant that bump stock was not a machine gun under the law. Likewise, the trigger has to be pulled each time for an FRT to work.

The government’s lawyer tried to argue this isn’t the same thing because a bump stock replaces a stock, whereas an FRT replaces the trigger pack. It highlighted the ATF’s test to “prove” that an AR-15 equipped with a FRT fired automatically. When the ATF held the trigger back with a zip tie, the gun continued to fire, but when explaining to the panel, the lawyer left out the fact that the trigger was still able to move due to the elastic nature of the tie.

The ATF’s lawyer also argued because the trigger must move to fire doesn’t mean a gun is not a machine gun. He highlighted that the bolts of machine guns move, and they are still considered to be automatic firing weapons. He didn’t address that if the bolt didn’t move, the gun could only fire a single round and would not be able to chamber the next round. This change would make the firearm a bolt-action rifle. He seemed ill-prepared for the questions, highlighting his lack of knowledge of how a gun works.

He then tried to argue that NAGR was not an actual member organization because its membership doesn’t vote on leadership and policies. Lawyers for NAGR pushed back, pointing out that the organization’s members all have a common purpose for protecting the right to bear arms. The judges didn’t seem persuaded by the government’s arguments.

The government lawyers also argued that they should not have to notify the public that FRTs are not illegal and shouldn’t have to give back the ones they took. They claimed this was an impossible burden, although they had the records of the owners of every single one they confiscated, and every address mailed a letter demanding the triggers be turned in. It seemed this was the government’s most significant issue. Although it is less clear how the judges viewed this argument, it didn’t seem like they were persuaded.

After the panel issues its ruling, the losing party can request an en banc hearing from the full Fifth Circuit bench or directly appeal to SCOTUS. When that happens, Biden will no longer be president. If the ATF loses, it might be one of the first decisions a Trump DOJ must make.

About John Crump

Mr. Crump is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons, follow him on X at @crumpyss, or at www.crumpy.com.