DOJ Says Its Sticking With Biden-Era Rule That White House Calls Attack on Gun Owners

When Donald Trump was on the campaign rail in 2024, he told gun owners at the Great American Outdoors Show that “Every single Biden attack on gun owners and manufacturers will be terminated my very first week back in office, perhaps my first day.”

While his administration has halted enforcement of some of those attacks, others remain in place. And today we learned that the DOJ doesn’t plan on making any changes to the Biden rule redefining frames and receivers. In fact, it’s embracing the rule. 

🚨BREAKING🚨

Trump’s Department of Justice has decided to ADOPT Biden’s anti-gun rule that heavily restricts homemade firearms.

This is in stark contrast to the White House, which just called this Biden rule an “attack” on gun owners that “undermine[s] the Second Amendment.” pic.twitter.com/7ev3B8sQof

— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) April 9, 2026

You can read the final rule here, but the gist of it, at least as when it comes to frames and receivers, is this:

Definition of a “frame or receiver” includes a partially complete, disassembled, or nonfunctional frame or receiver that has reached a stage in manufacture where it may quickly and easily (“readily”) be made to function as a “frame or receiver” and expressly excludes a block of metal, liquid polymers and other raw materials or a frame or receiver that has been destroyed.

The rule also contained a new broad and subjective definition of “readily” as well, with the end result encompassing many unfinished frames and receivers and treating them as fully functional firearms. 

A frame or receiver parts kit containing a partially complete or disassembled billet or blank of a frame or receiver that is sold, distributed, or possessed with a compatible jig or template is a frame or receiver, as a person with online instructions and common hand tools may readily complete or assemble the frame or receiver parts to function as a frame or receiver.

Now, it takes time to formally undo a rule, just like the process for implementing a rule. And shortly after Trump took office, he did issue an executive order directing DOJ to examine all federal laws and rules in order to wipe away any anti-2A regulations in effect. 

That was over a year ago, however, and the DOJ hasn’t taken many steps to formally appeal any of the ATF rules put in place under Biden. The new directive is an even bigger slap in the face to the president’s pro-2A base, given that the recently released White Houe budget proposal explicitly targets the rule DOJ is adopting. 

Here is where the @WhiteHouse called the Biden rule on homemade guns an attack on gun owners. This was published by the Office of Management and Budget over the weekend. pic.twitter.com/cRCISF7uRe

— Aidan Johnston (@RealGunLobbyist) April 9, 2026

The budget continues to support the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) efforts to reverse regulations imposed by prior administrations that have effectively criminalized law-abiding gun ownership. The previous administration used the ATF to attack gun-owning Americans and undermine the Second Amendment by… the imposition of excessive restrictions on homemade firearms. 

What on earth is going on here? Is the decision to adopt the Biden-era rule on frames and receivers coming from a rogue official, is the lack of leadership at DOJ allowing high-ranking careerists to substitute their own positions for that of the administration, or has this decision been blessed by acting Attorney General Todd Blanche? 

This latest directive comes about three weeks after the ATF admitted in a court filing that, despite an order vacating the ATF rule treating brace-equipped pistols as short-barreled rifles, the agency still views some of those firearms as SBRs that must be registered under the National Firearms Act. 

The vacated rule is gone. But in a March 16 court filing in the ongoing Texas v. ATF case, the agency explicitly stated it is still enforcing the underlying NFA and GCA against braced pistols that meet the statutory definition of a short-barreled rifle. The DOJ isn’t defending the Biden rule, it’s enforcing the law the rule was built on. GOA has filed a motion for an injunction to stop that, too.

So gun owners who own braced AR-pistols are not in the clear just because the rule was vacated. If the ATF determines a specific firearm qualifies as an SBR under the NFA’s existing statutory definition (barrel under 16 inches, overall length under 26 inches, designed to be fired from the shoulder) the $200 tax stamp and registration requirements still apply, rule or no rule.

The administration also hasn’t moved to formally undo Biden’s rule that expanded the definition of those “engaged in the business” of dealing firearms to include almost every private citizen who offers a gun for sale, even if no sale ever takes place. I’ve been hearing for months that the repeal will happen “soon”, but after the DOJ’s decision to keep the Biden-era rule on frames and receivers in effect, who knows when or if that will happen at all. 

Republicans are already looking at a tough midterm cycle. The last thing the party needs is to tick off Second Amendment supporters with decisions that reinforce the cynical view that there’s no major difference between the two parties when it comes to our right to keep and bear arms. U.S. Attorney Jeanine Pirro has already caused conniptions within 2A spaces this week for defending D.C’s gun registration statutes, and now we’ve got Main Justice declaring the expansive definition of “frame’ and “receiver” adopted by ATF at the request of the gun control lobby looks just fine to the agency’s attorneys. 

Whatever the rationale for the DOJ’s directive on frames and receivers, it needs to be summarily reversed by Blanche before any more damage is done. This can’t wait for a permanent AG to be confirmed by the Senate. The DOJ has created a crisis of confidence among Second Amendment organizations and activists, and I hope Blanche and other DOJ officials understand they’ve got a serious problem on their hands.   

Editor’s Note: The radical left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun control policies and schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your VIP membership.