Court Kills Biden’s ATF Gun Rule — and Trump’s DOJ Tried to Save Part of It

Editor’s note: An earlier placeholder version of this story said the Supreme Court blocked this rule. That was wrong. It was a federal district court in Texas, and the full story is below. We’d rather correct ourselves than let anyone else do it.

The Biden administration’s signature gun-control move, the ATF’s 2024 “engaged in the business” rule, is dead. A federal judge in Texas wiped it off the books entirely. And here’s the twist nobody’s talking about: when it came time to bury it, Trump’s own Justice Department asked the judge to keep part of it alive.

What the Rule Did

In April 2024, after Congress refused to pass universal background checks, the ATF tried to get there by redefining who counts as a gun “dealer.” Under the rule, people who sold even a handful of firearms from a private collection could be presumed to be “engaged in the business,” forcing them to get a federal firearms license and run background checks. Gun-control groups openly called it a way to “expand background checks” by regulation. Translation: the agency did by rulemaking what your elected representatives wouldn’t do by vote.

Worse, the rule created “rebuttable presumptions,” meaning certain conduct was presumed to be dealing unless you proved otherwise. In America, the government is supposed to prove its case against you. Not the other way around.

How It Died

The case is Texas v. ATF, brought by Texas, several other states, and Gun Owners of America in the Northern District of Texas before Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk. The timeline:

• June 2024: The court blocked enforcement against the plaintiffs.
• September 30, 2025: A separate federal court in Alabama ruled ATF exceeded its statutory authority.
• April 2026: The DOJ dropped its appeal.
• June 12, 2026: Kacsmaryk entered final judgment vacating the entire rule nationwide under the Administrative Procedure Act.
• August 13, 2026: He denied DOJ’s request to modify that judgment. The whole rule stays dead.

The Part They Don’t Want You to Notice

Here’s where it gets interesting. In May 2026, the ATF, now under the Trump administration, published a proposed rule to “revise” the 2024 rule. It would strip out the presumptions and some of the worst pieces, but not repeal the whole thing. Then DOJ went back to Judge Kacsmaryk and asked him to only partially vacate the old rule, leaving the rest standing so the new version would be easier to roll out.

The judge wasn’t having it. He called DOJ’s position “too clever by half” and wrote that the government “cannot avoid the force of those Orders by rearranging a few words between the old Rule and the new one.” According to coverage of the ruling, he found the new proposal “doubles down on the substance of the old Rule,” including language that could reach gun owners who never sold a single firearm.

Let that sit for a second. A Republican administration, elected in part on Second Amendment promises, went to court to save a piece of a Biden gun rule. That’s the administrative state in one sentence: the parties change, the agency’s appetite doesn’t.

The ATF’s Own Numbers Undercut the Rule

In its own May 2026 filing, the ATF admitted the 2024 rule didn’t even increase dealer licensing. Type 01 dealer applications fell from 7,445 in fiscal 2021 to 4,160 in fiscal 2025. The presumptions weren’t cited in a single one of its administrative license proceedings since 2024, or in any civil forfeiture or criminal case. So the rule burdened ordinary gun owners with legal risk, didn’t accomplish its stated goal, and the agency knew it.

The Bottomz Up Take

This is a win, and gun owners earned it in court. But don’t let anyone tell you the fight is over. The ATF collected more than 2,200 public comments on its replacement rule, and the agency hasn’t given up on regulating private sales. The lesson is the same one we keep coming back to on this site: if Congress won’t pass it, an agency will try to write it. Watch the rulemaking, not just the votes.

— Bree Bottomz

Sources

• AmmoLand: Federal Judge Deals Final Death Blow to ATF’s ‘Engaged in the Business’ Rule (Aug. 2026)
• Federal Register: ATF proposed rule, Revising Regulations Defining “Engaged in the Business” (May 6, 2026)
• Regulations.gov docket ATF-2026-0074
• Giffords: Federal Regulation to Expand Background Checks (the rule’s supporters, in their own words)