Second Amendment advocates see the executive action as the first step in keeping campaign promise to defend the right to keep and bear arms.
President Donald Trump issued an executive order on Feb. 7 calling for a review of all Second Amendment-related policies, projects, rules, and government actions from January 2021 through January 2025.
It is the first official gun policy action Trump has taken in his second term.
Pro-Second Amendment groups have been watching the 47th president, who has engaged in a whirlwind of official acts, to see how he will fulfill his promise to defend Americans’ gun rights.
Gun control and gun safety activists have been warning that the second Trump administration could wreak havoc on gains they made under the Biden administration.
The gun control advocacy group Brady did not respond to The Epoch Times request for comment by publication time.
The executive order calls for reviewing “all presidential and agencies’ actions from January 2021 through January 2025 that purport to promote safety but may have impinged on the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens.”
Within 30 days of the order, the “Attorney General shall examine all orders, regulations, guidance, plans, international agreements, and other actions of executive departments and agencies to assess any ongoing infringements of the Second Amendment rights of our citizens, and present a proposed plan of action to the president, through the Domestic Policy Adviser, to protect the Second Amendment rights of all Americans.”
While campaigning for his second term, Trump had voiced support for the Second Amendment as an essential American right.
Speaking to the National Rifle Association (NRA) in Dallas last May, Trump vowed to support gun rights.
“The survival of our Second Amendment is on the ballot,” Trump said. “We need it for safety.”
According to the order, the review includes rules issued by the Department of Justice and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), including “agencies’ plans, orders, and actions regarding the so-called ‘enhanced regulatory enforcement policy’ about firearms and/or Federal firearms licensees.”
FFL holders and gun rights activists have complained that the ATF was using its so-called “zero tolerance policy” to shut down as many gun dealers as possible.
Under the policy, gun dealers said they were subject to losing their Federal Firearms Licenses (FFL) over minor clerical errors on ATF forms.
The order also calls for a review of “Reports and related documents issued by the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention.”
Biden opened the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention in September 2023. The office’s webpage was shut down on the second day of Trump’s second term.
Second Amendment advocates hailed the executive order as Trump’s first step toward keeping his campaign promise.
“Promises made to law-abiding gun owners are being kept by President Donald J. Trump,” said NRA Executive Vice President and CEO Doug Hamlin.
“NRA members were instrumental, turning out in record numbers to secure his victory, and he is proving worthy of their votes, faith, and confidence in his first days in office.”
Aidan Johnston, Gun Owners of America’s Director of Federal Affairs, said the organization would support any efforts to lift restrictions placed on the Second Amendment.
“GOA will not rest until every illegal gun grab from the Biden administration is fully repealed and the Second Amendment is fully restored,” Johnston wrote in a statement released on Feb. 7.
Much of Biden’s gun control agenda was rooted in the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (ACT), which was passed in June 2022 and called for tighter gun laws, expanded background checks, “red flag” laws, and other measures.
Throughout his administration, Biden pointed to the Act as mandating the executive orders, agency rules, and policy changes he was able to implement.
