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Federal Judge Rules Biden Era ‘Ghost Gun’ Restrictions Unconstitutional Despite Supreme Court Ruling Last Year
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Federal Judge Rules Biden Era ‘Ghost Gun’ Restrictions Unconstitutional Despite Supreme Court Ruling Last Year
A federal judge in Texas has ruled that key portions of the Biden administration’s controversial “ghost gun” regulations violate the U.S. Constitution, reopening a major Second Amendment fight just over a year after the U.S. Supreme Court allowed the federal rule to stand.
U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor ruled Monday that the 2022 Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives rule violates both the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms and the Fifth Amendment’s due process protections.
The rule targeted privately assembled firearms and gun building kits that can be purchased and completed by individuals. It required manufacturers of covered kits and components to obtain federal licenses, place serial numbers on their products and require background checks for purchasers, requirements already applied to commercially manufactured firearms.
The decision is particularly significant because the U.S. Supreme Court ruled 7 to 2 in favor of the federal government in March 2025 in Bondi v. VanDerStok. However, the Supreme Court did not decide whether the regulation violated the Second Amendment. Instead, the justices addressed a different question: whether ATF had authority under the federal Gun Control Act to classify certain weapon parts kits and unfinished frames or receivers as firearms. The Supreme Court concluded that at least some of those products could legally fall within the statute, reversing an earlier decision that had invalidated the regulation, which left constitutional challenges available when the case returned to the lower courts.
O’Connor concluded that restricting access to components used to manufacture or repair firearms interferes with conduct protected by the Second Amendment. He pointed specifically to America’s historical tradition of individuals manufacturing their own firearms. “Self manufacture of firearms in America was common and indeed foundational to establishing our Nation,” O’Connor wrote. The judge concluded that the regulation conflicted with that historical tradition and was also too vague to satisfy Fifth Amendment due process requirements.
There is an important limitation to Monday’s decision: O’Connor did not strike down the regulation nationwide. Instead, he blocked enforcement against gun manufacturer Defense Distributed and members of the Second Amendment Foundation involving certain products covered by the case. That means the ruling represents another major legal challenge to the Biden era regulation, but it does not automatically erase the federal ghost gun rule across the United States.
The Second Amendment Foundation celebrated the ruling, with Executive Director Adam Kraut calling the Biden era regulation “a mess.” Gun control organizations sharply disagreed. Everytown Law Executive Director Eric Tirschwell argued there is no constitutional right to purchase or sell an untraceable firearm kit without a background check and called on the Department of Justice to appeal the ruling. The Justice Department had not immediately announced whether it would appeal.
The unusual legal situation now leaves the federal government with a regulation that survived a 7 to 2 Supreme Court statutory challenge in 2025, but has now been found unconstitutional on separate Second and Fifth Amendment grounds by the federal judge who originally struck it down. The dispute could ultimately put the Biden era ghost gun regulations back before a federal appeals court and potentially the Supreme Court, with the Second Amendment itself squarely at the center of the fight.
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