Supreme Court Throws Out Bump Stock Rule in 6-3 Decision

Last updated on August 7th, 2024 at 04:28 pm

The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday overruled a Trump-era regulation that treats firearms equipped with bump stocks the same way as machine guns.

Bump stocks are devices that can be mounted on the back of a firearm that create a reciprocating action that rapidly moves a trigger from the fired position back to its reset position. These devices can increase the speed at which a shooter is able to actuate the trigger of a firearm, allowing them to fire rapidly in a manner resembling that of a machinegun.

The legality of these bump stock devices has been a matter of debate for years. Federal laws strictly regulate access to machineguns, which are defined as “any weapon which shoots, is designed to shoot, or can be readily restored to shoot, automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger.” Various gun rights advocates have argued bump stocks create a rapid-firing action that is distinct from machine guns.

Throughout the 2000s, the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) repeatedly examined early iterations of bump stocks and determined they do not qualify as machine guns, which are strictly regulated under federal law. Following the 2017 Las Vegas shooting in which federal investigators alleged the shooter used multiple rifles equipped with bump stocks, the ATF issued a new rule declaring bump stocks to be machine gun devices and requiring owners to destroy or surrender them.

Michael Cargill originally sued to challenge the ATF rule, arguing it violated the Administrative Procedure Act (APA), which generally states executive branch agencies must have clear authorization from Congress to set regulations.

In a 6-3 decision authored by Justice Clarence Thomas, the court ruled in known as Garland v. Cargill that the ATF did not have sufficient authority to redefine a bump stock as a machine gun.

“We conclude that semiautomatic rifle equipped with a bump stock is not a ‘machinegun’ because it does not fire more than one shot ‘by a single function of the trigger,'” Thomas wrote.

In his opinion, Thomas noted individuals firing semi-automatic rifles may be able to achieve high rates of fire using a technique known as bump firing. He states bump firing does not require a bump stock, but that a bump stock is one example of a device that can make it easer for a person to bump-fire a rifle. Still, Thomas noted the bump-firing technique is a balancing act that focuses not on the actual mechanical function of a firearm’s trigger, but on a shooter’s ability to maintain a precise amount of forward pressure on their semiautomatic firearm.

“The shooter must maintain enough forward pressure to ensure that he will bump the trigger with sufficient force to engage it. But, if the shooter applies too much forward pressure, the rifle will not slide back far enough to allow the trigger to reset. The right balance produces a reciprocating motion that permits the shooter to repeatedly engage and release the trigger in rapid succession,” Thomas wrote.

Thomas reiterated that the existing law states a machinegun is one that achieves rapid fire from “a single function of the trigger” rather than a device or technique that allows an individual to rapidly pull and then release a trigger. Thomas contends that this ability to bump-fire a semiautomatic rifle, with or without a bump stock, defeats the idea that a bump-stock can be considered a machinegun under the current definition in law.

“The dissent and ATF themselves acknowledge, a shooter manually bump firing a semiautomatic rifle can achieve continuous fire by holding his trigger finger stationary and maintaining forward pressure with his nontrigger hand. Yet, they agree that a semiautomatic rifle without a bump stock ‘fires only one shot each time the shooter pulls the trigger.’ Their argument is thus at odds with itself.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor dissented from this majority view, in an opinion joined by Justices Elena Kagan and Ketanji Brown Jackson. She argued that the mechanical differences between automatic fire and a bump-fired semiautomatic weapon are insignificant.

“When I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, I call that bird a duck,” Sotamayor wrote.

She further argued that while a shooter may manage to achieve the bump-fire technique without a bump stock, such a device “automates and stabilizes the bump firing process” to the point that a user can achieve rapid fire simply by keeping their finger on the trigger rest of a bump stock and by maintaining forward pressure on their rifle.

“The majority holds that continuous forward pressure is too much human input for bump-stock-enabled continuous fire to be ‘automatic,'” Sotamayor continued. “The majority’s reading flies in the face of this Court’s standard tools of statutory interpretation.”

Justice Samuel Alito, concurred with Thomas’s majority opinion, but wrote that the Congress that initially moved to regulate machineguns under the 1934 National Firearms Act likely “would not have seen any material difference between a machinegun and a semiautomatic rifle equipped with a bump stock.”

Following the Supreme Court’s decision overturning the ATF bump stock rule, President Joe Biden called on Congress to “ban bump stocks, pass an assault weapon ban, and take additional action to save lives.” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has said Senate Democrats are ready to pass such a law.

Gun Owners of America, in turn, called on its supporters to call their Senators and oppose new legislation specifically covering bump stocks.

The Supreme Court ruling comes as the ATF has seen other recent setbacks to new gun control regulations, as plaintiffs have challenged their legality under the APA. A Federal judge on Thursday vacated an ATF rule treating some firearms equipped with stabilizing braces as short-barreled rifles. Another federal judge granted a preliminary injunction for a limited set of plaintiffs as they challenge another new ATF rule that would expand the definition of firearms-related business activities requiring federal licensing.