Vern Evans
We just reported on Monday about the Department of Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) planning to make the Biden Administration’s “temporary” export ban a permanent policy. Now, a U.S. Senator is making plans to skuttle the BIS scheme.
On Tuesday, Republican U.S. Sen. Bill Hagerty of Tennessee announced plans to file a Congressional Review Act (CRA) Resolution of Disapproval to block the interim Final Rule.
At issue is the supposed 90-day pause—it had already reached more than 180 days—that severely restricts the ability of American firearm, ammunition and related component manufacturers to obtain a license to export their products for sale. Many observers consider the move to be yet another blatant attack by the Biden Administration on America’s firearms industry.
“This rule is another Operation Choke Point—a politically motivated effort that significantly harms Tennessee manufacturers—and will consequently destroy U.S. jobs and small businesses that support the firearm and ammunition industry,” Sen. Hagerty said in a press release announcing the action. “The Biden Administration has made clear that its goal is to damage the firearm industry that supplies the products that allow Americans to exercise their constitutional freedom. Crushing American exports is just a means to skirt the legislative process and do damage to yet another Biden-disfavored industry. I’m pleased to lead my colleagues in an effort to overturn this unlawful and unwarranted rule and protect American enterprise.”
One cosponsor of the resolution, Republican Sen. Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, believes the Final Rule is yet another attack on the right of Americans to keep and bear arms.
“With its issuance of this rule, the Department of Commerce is continuing the Biden administration’s assault on the Second Amendment,” Sen. Blackburn said. “By targeting the manufacturing base of a constitutionally protected industry with regulatory burdens that will decimate small manufacturers and their employees, the Biden administration is using national security as a veil to cover up its anti-gun agenda, while failing to address the real national security crisis taking place at our southern border.”
According to an analysis of the Final Rule by the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), there will be three new Export Control Classification Numbers (ECCN) for semi-automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns. Licenses will be approved on a case-by-case basis that will consider foreign policy, national security risk factors, government corruption, diversion of firearms and human rights abuses among other criteria. BIS is stating there will be a presumption of denial for firearm export licenses to those countries arbitrarily identified by the State Department as “at risk,” which include 36 countries—mostly in Latin America, the Caribbean and Southeast Asian countries.
The Resolution of Disapproval is co-sponsored by 10 other Republican senators including Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Ted Budd of North Carolina, Shelley Moore Capito of West Virginia, Tom Cotton of Arkansas, Kevin Cramer of North Dakota, Mike Crapo and Jim Risch of Idaho, Steve Daines of Montana, Deb Fisher of Nebraska and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming.
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