The gun control group Brady: United Against Gun Violence is hopping mad that their “name-and-shame” charade no longer enjoys government support. They’re so mad, in fact, the group is suing to force the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to violate federal law, risk law enforcement safety and release data so they can twist a media narrative to falsely accuse firearm retailers for the criminal misuse of firearms.
Brady filed a lawsuit at the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia to force the DOJ and ATF to answer their Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for information surrounding the Demand Letter 2 Program. That program, begun during the antigun Clinton administration, requires firearm retailers to provide additional information to the ATF when 25 or more firearms are traced back to them subsequent to the recovery at a crime scene and the time from retail sale to trace is three years or less (what ATF calls “time-to-crime”) in a calendar year.
This information is protected from public release, and for good reason. The Tiahrt rider, which has been reauthorized by Congress since it was passed in 2003, restricts public access to sensitive, law enforcement-only firearm tracing data. This restriction is supported by Congress, ATF and law enforcement groups such as the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP) because it secures sensitive tracing information which would jeopardize ongoing criminal investigations and put the lives of law enforcement officers, cooperating retailers and witnesses at risk.
Brady would rather have their media “name-and-shame” narrative instead of protecting the lives of law enforcement investigating illegal firearm trafficking cases.
Protecting Against Abuse, Law Enforcement Lives
Former ATF Acting Director Michael Sullivan wrote of the importance of safeguarding firearm trace data and not using this information as a political football.
“If the Tiahrt Amendment were repealed, it could seriously undermine, if not eviscerate, the critically important investigations ATF special agents and local law enforcement are building to bring illegal firearm traffickers to justice,” former Acting Director Sullivan wrote. “However, it’s becoming clearer that some within the administration see this as a calculated opportunity to set the conditions for a ‘name-and-shame’ effort to smear firearm retailers and manufacturers, at the expense of ATF’s important and well-executed mission, which includes relationships with those in the industry who also want to keep firearms out of the hands of prohibited persons.”
He added, “The ATF has long held that firearm trace data isn’t to be used as a political tool.”
Gun control groups like Brady, Michael Bloomberg’s gun control mouthpiece for Everytown for Gun Safety, The Trace and others have abused this information to smear firearm retailers as somehow being complicit in crimes for which they have no responsibility. NSSF has been critical of the misuse of this protected firearm trace data to attempt to “name-and-shame” firearm retailers for crimes in which they had no involvement.
It wasn’t just gun control groups that abused and warped the data to fit their antigun narrative. Former ATF Director Steve Dettelbach came under criticism for sharing protected trace data with USA Today and Brady, a violation of the Tiahrt Amendment. So has U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) when he introduced legislation to force publication of the protected trace data. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham sought to “name-and-shame” firearm retailers in her failed “emergency public health order” that was nothing more than a sham gun control pitch before courts blocked it.
Demand Letter 2 Ripe for Abuse
The ATF has long been wary of the misuse of this information. The ATF provides a disclaimer with this statement: “Firearms are normally traced to the first retail seller, and sources reported for firearms traced do not necessarily represent the sources or methods by which firearms in general are acquired for use in crime.”
Even earlier, the ATF wrote in the 1998 Crime Gun Trace Analysis Reports, “The appearance of [a licensed dealer] or a first unlicensed purchaser of record in association with a crime gun or in association with multiple crime guns in no way suggests that either the federal firearms licensed dealer (FFL) or the first purchaser has committed criminal acts. Rather, such information may provide a starting point for further and more detailed investigation.”
In April 2024, the ATF released Volume Three of the National Firearms Commerce and Trafficking Assessment. The report focused specifically on 9,700 ATF firearm trafficking investigations over a five-year period between 2017 and 2021.
The ATF’s own report found just 136 cases of illegal firearm trafficking tied to an FFL over the five-year period — just 1.6 percent of all 9,700 cases. With 134,516 FFLs at the end of 2021, that equates to just 0.1 percent of all FFLs being implicated in allegedly illegal firearm trafficking.
Conversely, illegal straw purchases and private sales accounted for 80 percent of all cases. Stolen firearms represented another 25 percent of cases of illegally trafficked firearms.
Even the ATF acknowledged that the firearm industry is doing its part in self-policing.
“The data analyzed in this report indicates that a shift in the types of trafficking channels used over the course of the last two decades has occurred,” the report states. “Corrupt FFL investigations represented almost 9% of trafficking investigations in the 2000 report, but now represent less than two percent of trafficking investigations.”
Time to End It
The Demand Letter 2 Program is rife with problems. That’s why the ATF confirmed last year that the program is ending. ATF Director Robert Cekada wrote to Congress during his confirmation process that he supports pausing the program because “efforts of advocacy groups to mischaracterize the Demand Letter program and evade… disclosure restrictions on related data. This pause is allowing the ATF to evaluate the program effectiveness from reporting mandated to tracing results.”
NSSF was encouraged by the ATF’s confirmation last year that the Demand Letter 2 Program was ending. However, it would be foolish to think that the gun control’s “name-and-shame” gravy train wouldn’t end without a legal fight. That’s why NSSF gives full-throated support to Rep. Clay Higgins’ (R-La.) Law Enforcement Protection and Privacy Act, H.R. 1698. This bill would enhance safeguards for protected firearm trace data. Essentially it would put “teeth to the Tiahrt rider” by providing accountability for individuals who purposefully and unlawfully release this sensitive law enforcement information that is reserved for use in law enforcement investigations.
Brady, and their gun control allies, knows the spigot of trace data leaks is being shut off. That’s got them not just hopping mad. It’s got them hopping into federal court to demand the DOJ and ATF violate federal law and risk the lives of law enforcement to feed their corrupt media narrative. The name that needs to be shamed is Brady and their gun control allies.
– Larry Keane
Larry Keane is SVP for Government and Public Affairs, Assistant Secretary and General Counsel of the National Shooting Sports Foundation.
