The Trump Department of Justice has decided to keep a Biden-era regulation that subjects firearm parts kits and so-called "ghost guns" to the same federal rules as traditional firearms, a move that drew immediate fire from some of the most prominent Second Amendment organizations in the country, as the Daily Caller reported.
Gun Owners of America shared an email from a DOJ attorney on April 9 revealing that the government intends to maintain the Biden administration's "Frame or Receiver" definition contained in ATF Final Rule 2021R-05F. The decision stands in tension with President Trump's own February 2025 executive order on "Protecting Second Amendment Rights", the very order the DOJ cited when it originally requested a stay to review the rule.
The result: a regulation drafted under the Biden administration, challenged in federal court, and upheld by the Supreme Court in March 2025, now carries the full backing of a Republican DOJ. For gun-rights groups that spent years fighting the rule and trusted Trump's campaign pledges, the word from the Justice Department landed like a broken promise.
The DOJ attorney's email, shared by Gun Owners of America on X, referenced the ongoing case VanDerStock v. Blanche in the Northern District of Texas. The attorney wrote:
"As you know, in VanDerStock v. Blanche (N.D. Texas), the government previously requested a stay to evaluate ATF Final Rule 2021R-05F in light of Executive Order 14206 ('Protecting Second Amendment Rights'). At this time, the government has decided to maintain the current definition of firearm 'frame' and 'receiver' contained in that final rule."
That language is notable for what it omits. No explanation. No reasoning. No acknowledgment that the rule was one of three ATF actions the White House itself had characterized as attacks on gun owners. Just a flat declaration that the Biden-era definition stays.
The DOJ did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation's request for comment.
Aidan Johnston, Gun Owners of America's director of federal affairs, did not mince words. In a statement to the Daily Caller News Foundation, Johnston laid out the gap between what the White House has said and what the DOJ has done.
"On the campaign trail, President Trump promised to end Biden's ATF rules, and just last week the White House appeared to affirm his commitment to ending what it called the three major attacks on gun owners by the Biden administration. Yet, all three major Biden ATF rules are in full effect: the Pistol Brace Ban Rule, the Engaged in the Business Rule, and now the Frame and Receiver Rule."
Johnston went further, saying gun owners "feel betrayed and abandoned as we head into the midterms." He called on Trump to "clean house at the Department of Justice" and to use the appointment of a new attorney general to overhaul the department's gun policy.
That reference to a new attorney general carries fresh weight. Trump recently fired Attorney General Pam Bondi and tapped Todd Blanche as acting replacement, a shake-up that left the department in transition at the very moment this gun-rule decision surfaced.
Kostas Moros, director of legal research and education at the Second Amendment Foundation, made a pointed observation on X. He noted that the frame-and-receiver rule is not a law passed by Congress, it is an administrative rule adopted by one administration that the next is free to discard.
"It's just a rule adopted by one Admin, and the next is free to scrap it. They don't have to keep it, and until now, it looked like they weren't going to. Clearly, something abruptly changed."
What changed, and who changed it, remains unclear. The DOJ's email offered no window into the internal deliberations.
The sequence of events makes the DOJ's decision harder to square with the administration's stated priorities. In February 2025, Trump signed Executive Order 14206, titled "Protecting Second Amendment Rights." Just the News reported that the order directed the DOJ to review all federal gun-related rules, regulations, guidance, plans, and international agreements for potential infringements on Second Amendment rights. Trump wrote that the right to keep and bear arms "must not be infringed" because it is "foundational to maintaining all other rights held by Americans."
That order also tasked then-Attorney General Bondi with preparing a plan to protect Second Amendment rights and coordinating its implementation across the executive branch.
In March 2025, the Supreme Court upheld the Biden administration's frame-and-receiver rule. That ruling gave the regulation stronger legal footing, but it did not require the Trump administration to keep it. The rule remains an executive-branch product, not a congressional statute.
In April 2025, the DOJ and ATF repealed the Biden administration's "zero tolerance" policy, a sign that the department was willing to roll back at least some Biden-era firearms enforcement. By May 2025, the Firearms Policy Coalition said it had provided the Trump White House, DOJ, and ATF with a complete, print-ready proposed rule to replace the regulation. The administration did not act on it.
Later, in July, the DOJ proposed a separate rule that "will provide citizens whose firearm rights are currently under legal disability with an avenue to restore those rights." And in December, the department launched a new Second Amendment Rights division, a move that, on paper, signaled the administration took gun rights seriously as a policy priority.
Then came the April 2026 email. After more than a year of review, the DOJ's answer was to keep the Biden rule intact.
Johnston's complaint is specific and verifiable on its face: all three of the Biden-era ATF rules that gun-rights groups targeted remain in effect. The Pistol Brace Ban Rule. The Engaged in the Business Rule. And now the Frame and Receiver Rule, with the DOJ's explicit endorsement.
The Firearms Policy Coalition offered its own assessment. FPC said Friday that Trump's February 2025 executive order has "proven to be little more than empty rhetoric." The group noted it had handed the administration a ready-made replacement rule more than a year ago.
That criticism cuts at something deeper than one regulation. It goes to whether the executive order that launched the review was a serious policy commitment or a gesture. The DOJ requested a stay in the VanDerStock litigation to evaluate the rule, then, after evaluating it, chose to keep it. The executive order's own language about protecting Second Amendment rights did not, in the end, lead to a different outcome on this rule.
The broader context at the Justice Department matters here. Bondi touted the DOJ's record in her first statement after being ousted, but the gun-rights community clearly sees unfinished business. Johnston's call to use the next attorney general appointment as a reset suggests the groups view the current DOJ leadership as part of the problem.
Meanwhile, the DOJ has taken some pro-Second Amendment positions elsewhere. It is backing a challenge to Hawaii's concealed-carry restrictions at the Supreme Court. That action shows the department is willing to fight for gun rights in certain arenas, which makes the decision to preserve the frame-and-receiver rule all the more conspicuous.
The open questions are significant. Did the Supreme Court's March 2025 ruling effectively settle the matter inside the DOJ? Did career attorneys prevail over political appointees? Did the recent turnover at the top of the department, with Acting AG Blanche now steering the ship, affect the timing or substance of the decision?
None of those questions have public answers. The DOJ's email was terse. Its silence since has been complete.
For gun owners who took the president at his word, the gap between campaign rhetoric and regulatory reality is now measurable. Three Biden ATF rules. Three rules still standing. One executive order that ordered a review. And a review that ended with the status quo.
The administration still has time and tools to act. Executive orders can be followed by executive action. New leadership at the DOJ could change the calculus. But as Johnston noted, midterms are approaching, and the constituency that cares most about this issue is watching the scoreboard, not the press releases.
Trump's recent dismissal of cabinet shake-up concerns suggests the White House views its personnel moves as strategic, not chaotic. Gun-rights groups are asking for that strategy to produce results, specifically, the repeal of rules the president himself campaigned against.
Promises are easy to make on the trail. Regulations are harder to kill inside a bureaucracy that prefers to keep them. Gun owners have heard that excuse before, and they are running out of patience with it.