…If a man lies under oath or procures the lie of another under oath, if he perjures himself or suborns perjury, he is guilty under the statute law. Under the higher law, under the great law of morality and righteousness, he is precisely as guilty if, instead of lying in a court, he lies in a newspaper or on the stump; and in all probability, the evil effects of his conduct are infinitely more widespread and more pernicious. — Teddy Roosevelt – May 12, 1900

Author, Self-Described Gun Control Proponent, Says Gun Bans Don’t Work

A British-Canadian journalist and self-described gun control advocate who has authored a new book being released today—The American Way of Killing—told Time magazine in a Sept. 22 interview that he doesn’t think bans on so-called “assault weapons” work, and he also acknowledged the elimination of handguns is not likely possible.

Malcolm Gladwell, a staff writer at The New Yorker for the past 30 years, has published eight books relating to the social sciences. He has finally gotten around to discussing gun-related violence in the U.S., but it is not clear that he understands the importance of the Second Amendment, and right-to-bear-arms tenets woven into more than 40 state constitutions.

Asked by Time editor-at-large Belinda Luscombe whether he thinks banning modern semiautomatic rifles—the so-called “assault weapons” now the subject of an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court with oral arguments scheduled Dec. 2—his reply was blunt.

“No. Assault-rifle bans of the sort that have been passed and contemplated in the United States are completely pointless,” Gladwell stated. “They’re just a charade, and they are a distraction from the real issues. I think gun control can play an important role in violence prevention. But empty theatrical exercises in removing a class of rifles because they look a certain way do not move the needle.”

Coming from a gun control proponent, that amounts to blasphemy. And while Gladwell sticks to his guns (no pun intended), he admits the elimination of handguns in the U.S. is unlikely.

Aside from Supreme Court rulings that handguns are protected by the Second Amendment—which protects the right to keep and bear arms from government infringement—he just doesn’t believe removing them is possible.

“There’s the obvious political thing that people with guns are the most motivated to fight hardest politically,” he observed. “The Supreme Court currently has been captured by a majority of people who believe very strongly in gun rights. I don’t know how many hundreds of millions of guns there are in America, but there’s a lot. Practically speaking, I don’t know how you get rid of them. No one’s ever answered that. I’m as big an advocate of gun control as anyone else, but I have no clue about how it would work if it was passed. I mean, are you going into people’s homes to remove their guns? Very few gun-control advocates have a good answer to that question.”

Gladwell doesn’t mention the high court rulings which say gun ownership, especially handgun ownership, is protected by the Constitution. But he does point a finger at liberals who are adverse to recognizing that irresponsible people use guns to kill people, and that the gun, itself, doesn’t make that call.

“One of the many annoying things about the gun debate in America is the extent to which liberals roll their eyes at ‘Guns don’t kill people; people do,’” he told Time. “I understand their aversion to it because it was dreamt up by people who wanted to escape any responsibility at all for the presence of guns in America…One of the irresponsible things about progressive views on gun violence is the extent to which they use their legitimate antipathy towards guns as an excuse not to address more fundamental issues about human behavior.”

He also maintains that the so-called “epidemic of gun violence” often claimed by anti-gunners, is “an epidemic we invented.”

He doesn’t think criminal activity in the U.S. is inherent, but a problem “that was brought about by a wide set of very specific choices, misapprehensions, and errors.”

In a proverbial nutshell, Gladwell may have unwittingly indicted the political left. They don’t like guns, but their solutions, such as banning the most popular rifle in America, are non-starters. In reality, they really have no solutions at all that will pass muster under the Second Amendment, which is enjoying something of a revival under the Roberts Supreme Court, and many observers expect that to be strengthened even more when the Court rules on the constitutionality of semi-auto bans sometime in mid-2027.

Study on firearm safety pours cold water on anti-2A storage law assumptions.

A new study revealed that firearms safety education was far more effective at encouraging gun owners to securely store firearms than legislation was.

The study, published by Crime and Delinquency in June, sought to determine how prevalent firearms safety training was as well as how many firearms owners kept their firearms secure.

The study found that 90% of gun owners reported receiving at least informal firearms safety training.

“Within the United States, a substantial 90% of owners report receiving some form of instruction, typically divided into formal and informal tracks,” the study said.

“Formal training generally encompasses structured hunter safety, self-defense, or professional courses. On the other hand, informal training, which was reported by roughly 70% of owners, is a form of cultural transmission passing through friends or family.”

Anti-Second Amendment groups like Giffords and Everytown have pushed for legislation that would hold people criminally responsible in the event a child gained access to a firearm.

According to the groups, 26 states and the District of Columbia have laws that leave a gun owner subject to potential prosecution should a child gain access to the firearm.

The study, though, noted that the laws were not effective at increasing the rate at which firearms owners safely stored their firearms. Instead, the best predictor was having received firearms safety training at some point.

“The results from our multivariable model show that the strongest predictors of secure firearm storage were completing a form of gun safety training, either formal or informal, demonstrating that gun safety training and secure firearm storage are interconnected,” the study said.

“Together, these findings suggest that most gun owners in the United States are well-versed in firearm safety practices and store their guns securely when they are not using them.”

“Another interesting finding from analyses was that having a state law requiring secure firearm storage was unrelated to gun owners’ storing their weapons securely.

This confirms findings in prior research and suggests that policymakers should focus on other mechanisms to promote secure firearm storage,” the study added later.

What the FTC’s Beretta-Ruger Order Actually Means

The Federal Trade Commission’s announcement about Beretta Holding and Sturm, Ruger & Company sounds dramatic. The agency says it is stopping an anticompetitive arrangement between two major firearm manufacturers. TFB covered the companies’ cooperation agreement in May; this is the regulatory decision that followed it.

The FTC’s headline, “FTC Takes Action to Prevent Anticompetitive Arrangement in Beretta, Ruger Deal,” could leave the impression that the FTC blocked a Beretta takeover of Ruger. It did not. There is no merger in this deal, and Beretta is not buying all of Ruger. The FTC objected to who could fill Beretta’s proposed Ruger board seats and what information might pass between the competing companies.

The stock purchase plan survived, and Beretta opened its tender offer September 17. If the FTC finalizes its proposed order, Beretta’s board nominees will face tighter rules.

Start With Who Owns What

Beretta Holding is the Luxembourg-based corporate parent of Beretta and numerous other firearm and outdoor brands. It began buying Ruger stock in 2025 and, by March 2026, reported owning 1,587,000 shares. That represented 9.95% of Ruger’s outstanding stock and made Beretta the company’s largest shareholder.

Ruger responded to the growing position by adopting a shareholder-rights plan in October 2025. These plans are commonly called poison pills. Ruger’s plan was designed to deter any investor from crossing a 10% ownership threshold without board approval.

The dispute grew fairly ugly in public. Beretta sought a larger position and nominated four candidates for Ruger’s board. Ruger accused its competitor of trying to gain disproportionate influence. Beretta argued that Ruger needed operational changes and that its investment could help. They eventually settled the fight.

Continue reading “”

It’s a Texas Twofer™

Austin homeowner shoots, kills 24-year-old man who police say broke into home

A homeowner shot and killed a 24-year-old man who police say broke into an Austin home and entered a bedroom early Wednesday.

Austin police identified the man on Thursday as Dmario Antonie Jones.

Officers were called to the 200 block of Virtus Bend at 3:51 a.m. Wednesday after a reported burglary. They arrived to find Jones with gunshot wounds, according to authorities. Austin-Travis County EMS attempted lifesaving measures before Jones was pronounced dead at 4:10 a.m.

Police said their preliminary investigation showed that Jones entered the home intending to burglarize it. After he reached a bedroom, police said the homeowner shot him. Detectives questioned the homeowner, whom police did not identify publicly, and later released them. As of Thursday, no charges had been filed in connection with the shooting.

⇓ *cough* – *cough* ⇓ [lazy, lackadaisical law enforcement]

Jones had pleaded guilty a week earlier to a state jail felony theft charge stemming from the May theft of roofing materials from a Travis County lumber yard. He was sentenced to 120 days in jail but received credit for 120 days he had already spent in custody, according to court records.

In a separate case, the Travis County district attorney’s office declined Aug. 31 to pursue an organized criminal activity charge against Jones, citing insufficient evidence.

Man dies after being shot during reported home invasion in Pampa

PAMPA, Texas (KVII) — A man died after police say he forced his way into a Pampa home and was shot by an occupant who feared for their safety.

Pampa police responded around 11:30 p.m. Friday to a reported shooting at a home in the 1300 block of North Duncan Street.

Officers found a man inside the home suffering from a gunshot wound. Officers and other emergency personnel treated him before he was taken by ambulance to Pampa Regional Medical Center.

He was later transferred to an Amarillo hospital in critical condition, where he died from his injuries.

According to the preliminary investigation, the man knew the residents of the home but was uninvited and forced his way inside.

Police said one of the occupants, fearing for their safety, got a handgun and shot the man.

The Pampa Police Department’s Criminal Investigations Division is investigating. Once the investigation is complete, the findings will be presented to the district attorney for review and consideration of possible criminal charges.

ATF Says Suppressor and SBR Guidance Could Arrive Within Weeks

During “The Briefing,” an FFL compliance event hosted by FastBound, several high-ranking officials from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) attended, including ATF Director Robert Cekada, who answered industry questions.

Most attendees wanted guidance on transfers of suppressors, short-barreled rifles (SBRs), short-barreled shotguns (SBSs), and any other weapons (AOWs). Director Cekada could not give specifics, but he offered hints about what is coming down the pike.

The biggest question is when the ATF will release the guidance. According to Cekada, the rule is not done, but it is close. He highlighted that the ATF is only one stakeholder involved in the new guidance. The other two are the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the White House. AmmoLand sources believe the White House is delaying the guidance’s release. According to the director, he believes the guidance will be released in the next couple of weeks.

 

The goal of the guidance is to cover as many Americans as possible while protecting the gun owners covered by it from future anti-gun administrations.

The ATF will most likely not expand the injunction to a universal level. The guidance will address several big questions and issues. With more than 2.3 million suppressors sold this year, according to former NFA Chief Steve Albro, the need for guidance is immense.

One issue the guidance will address is the transfer of SBRs and SBSs. Currently, although these items are protected under the Silencer Shop Foundation case, an ATF Form 4 is required to transfer them because of the Gun Control Act (GCA) attorney general notification requirement. The guidance will “fix” that carve-out, which seems to imply that SBRs and SBSs can be transferred on a Form 4473 alone.

Cekada was clear that these items, and long guns in general, are not an issue. At the Briefing, Cekada called out groups whose goal is to demonize these guns.

Another issue the guidance will address is interstate travel with covered NFA items. The regulation will cover those situations. Also, 15 states require buyers of some covered items to comply with federal law. According to Cekada, the guidance may address that issue, although ATF Chief Legal Counsel Robert Lieder clarified that the ATF cannot force these states to take the bureau’s advice.

AmmoLand asked Director Cekada about guidance for industry operations inspectors (IOIs) on how to handle dealers they find transferring suppressors on a Form 4473 during an inspection. Cekada was adamant that a federal firearms licensee (FFL) found to be transferring suppressors on a Form 4473 will not be cited for violations. Former NFA Chief Albro later echoed this, saying the ATF’s policy is to presume all suppressors transferred via a Form 4473 were legally transferred.

One interesting topic that was brought up was forced reset triggers (FRTs). Cekada said some FRTs are true FRTs, but some on the market are machine guns, and he declined to name the specific FRTs the ATF thinks might be machine guns. He said the ATF has to look at how the trigger mechanism works but will go by the statutory definition of a machine gun.

Throughout the meeting, the ATF discussed changes to Form 4473. Those changes are still in progress. Things like the “County” box will be eliminated. According to Lieder, the ATF is making changes to the forms to comply with court rulings such as the Supreme Court’s Hemani case, which invalidated the firearms prohibition on marijuana users. The new Form 4473 will not be out until after the holiday season.

Mr. Lieder also covered the DOJ Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) opinion letter on sales of handguns and handgun ammunition to 18- to 20-year-olds. Lieder says the ATF is working on its systems to allow those transfers. The ATF was not informed that the letter would be issued.

Although the ATF will allow transferring handguns to these young adults, the ATF is likely to keep the age for transferring machine guns and destructive devices at 21. The ATF will release guidance in the coming weeks, according to Lieder.

The ATF will continue working on NFA rules dealing with suppressors, SBRs, SBSs, and AOWs. He wanted to make it clear they are not working on these rules despite the injunction. The goal of these rules is to backstop the current injunction in case something changes in the future. It is basically trying to future-proof against a future anti-gun administration. During this discussion, someone asked whether the ATF has plans to make the injunction “fairer” to those not covered. Lieder said their goal is to try to make any guidance as fair as possible without exceeding its power.

Mr. Lieder sees the biggest threats to the Second Amendment as private regulations and lawsuits. He highlighted monopolies and duopolies like common carriers and ride-share companies. He highlighted Waymo calling the police on a rider for having a gun. He also pointed to state lawsuits against firearm manufacturers.

Another hot topic was internet sales. According to Lieder, the industry is split. They are still considering comments from the rulemaking process, but he said those transfers are already legal under the law. The roadblock was ID verification, which is no longer an issue.

Another rule was hinted at but not confirmed: changes to “sporting purposes.” Lieder said they have been researching the law and might be reaching out for comments soon. These statements point to the rulemaking process, although nothing was confirmed.

Overall, the ATF answered many questions throughout the day, though some remain.