Rep. Lauren Boebert (R) has introduced legislation to abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF).
The bill is H.R. 129 and it comes at a point when Republicans are just weeks away from holding the House, Senate and White House.
Newsweek noted Boebert’s push to do away with the agency is the latest in line of Republican pushes to see the agency undone.
For example, in November 2024, Rep. Eric Burlison (R) called for the agency to be abolished as well.
On November 25, 2024, Breitbart News reported that Burlison told FOX News the ATF is “a disaster.”
He said, “For several decades they’ve been a disaster agency [which has] been violating the Second Amendment.”
The ATF issued numerous rules during the Biden/Harris administration, one of which criminalized owners of legally purchased AR-pistol stabilizer braces. Another one of the ATF’s rules declared that 80 percent complete firearm frames are firearms and therefore can only be acquired via background checks. Yet another ATF rule circumvented Congress via new regulations against private gun sales.
On January 2, 2024, Breitbart News pointed out that Biden’s ATF director, Steven Dettelbach, tendered his resignation effective January 18, 2025, two days before Trump retakes the White House.
Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms chairman Alan Gottlieb cheered the resignation, saying, “That’s one less person Trump will have to fire after he takes office, and it is one less gun prohibition lobbyist on the government payroll.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly: awrhawkins@breitbart.com