Through executive action, Obama has banned ammo for the top-selling AR-15 style semi-automatic, labeling them ‘cop killers’, and The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives will put the ban of 5.56 mm ammo on a fast track, which already driving up price and demand.
Gun stores are now reporting an increase in price of 30% and an increase in demand of 1000%.
Wednesday night, Rep. Bob Goodlatte, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, stepped in with a critical letter to the bureau demanding it explain the surprise and abrupt bullet ban. The letter is shown below.
The National Rifle Association, which is working with Goodlatte to gather co-signers, told Secrets that30 House members have already co-signed the letter and Goodlatte and the NRA are hoping to get a total of 100 fast.
“The Obama administration was unable to ban America’s most popular sporting rifle through the legislative process, so now it’s trying to ban commonly owned and used ammunition through regulation,” said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA-ILA, the group’s policy and lobby shop. “The NRA and our tens of millions of supporters across the country will fight to stop President Obama’s latest attack on our Second Amendment freedoms.”
At issue is so-called “armor-piercing” ammunition, an exemption for those bullets mostly used for sport by AR-15 owners, and the recent popularity of pistol-style ARs that use the ammo.
The inexpensive 5.56 M855 ammo, commonly called lightgreen tips, have been exempt for years, as have higher-caliber ammunition that also easily pierces the type of soft armor worn by police, because it’s mostly used by target shooters, not criminals. The agency proposes to reclassify it as armor-piercing and not exempt.
But now BATFE says that since the bullets can be used in semi-automatic handguns they pose a threat to police and must be banned from production, sale and use. But, as Goodlatte noted, the agency offered no proof. Federal agencies will still be allowed to buy the ammo.
“This round is amongst the most commonly used in the most popular rifle design in America, the AR-15. Millions upon millions of M855 rounds have been sold and used in the U.S., yet ATF has not even alleged — much less offered evidence — that even one such round has ever been fired from a handgun at a police officer,” said Goodlatte’s letter.
Even some police don’t buy the administration’s claim. “Criminals aren’t going to go out and buy a $1,000 AR pistol,” Brent Ball, owner of 417 Guns in Springfield, Mo., and a 17-year veteran police officer told the Springfield News-Leader. “As a police officer I’m not worried about AR pistols because you can see them. It’s the small gun in a guy’s hand you can’t see that kills you.”
Many see the bullet ban as an assault on the AR-15 and Obama’s back-door bid to end production and sale.
“We are concerned,” said Justin Anderson with Hyatt Gun Shop in Charlotte, N.C., one of the nation’s top sellers of AR-15 style rifles. “Frankly, we’re always concerned when the government uses back-door methods to impose quasi-gun control.”
Groups like the National Shooting Sports Foundation suggest that under BATFE’s new rule, other calibers like popular deer hunting .308 bullets could be banned because they also are used in AR platforms, some of which can be turned into pistol-style guns. “This will have a detrimental effect on hunting nationwide,” said the group.
LOL
If you are a veteran and you really believe armed citizens of today can stand up to the military you are a moron. Then again they don’t recruit people into the military of their intellect generally, at least not “grunts”. The military would roll over any armed civilian population with relative ease. If it came down to the citizens vs them the citizens would be sitting around with ar-15s getting bombed waiting to die a horrible death. You think citizens today could stand up to long term siege? Bombardment? Attack aircraft? Helicopters? That’s the delusional nature of people today, you think the idea of the populace rising up against the military is real. It’s not a real idea anymore. Most civilians would pee on themselves, go into a panic, then die. Especially those of you who have literally never killed anything beyond bugs in your whole lives. The idea you could resist actual killers is comedy.
F^^K His Pen .
F**k-off Obama. Anything or any law that you have made is a joke and the American people laugh at every thing you say. Take your laws and executive action and shove them up your$#%&!@* And by$#%&!@*I don”t mean your wife
Justin Peters Yes
, I am a veteran and I do not own a gun. I have 4 college degrees and have been published 12 times
The Feurer has decreed…Sieg Heil !
Old News, happened last spring, was immediately shot down… no story here.
This story was first reported by “f**e news” in Feb 2015. Anyone one tired of the Tea Party besides me
That is why I have the AR10 .308.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/mar/10/atf-drops-proposed-ammo-ban/?page=all