The Patriot Post® · Obama's Parting Shot: Lead Ammo Ban

On his way out the door, Barack Obama moved to unilaterally kill two birds with one stone. Thanks to an eleventh hour wielding of the executive pen, Obama succeeded in appeasing both ecofascists and anti-gun activists by creating a safe space to protect against lead-tainted ammo on federal land. This has particularly huge consequences in a number of western states, Nick Leghorn notes, because, when combined with other prohibitive state gun control laws, the decree basically amounts to a de facto blanket ammunition ban.

“The latest Obama Administration executive action effectively bans all lead ammunition from federally owned land,” writes Leghorn, “meaning that non-lead ammo (such as copper and compressed metal projectiles) are now the only acceptable ammunition for any firearm. The problem there (amongst others): states like California explicitly ban handgun ammunition that isn’t lead based, saying it is ‘armor piercing.’ That sets up a nice little circular logic, the end result of which is that handguns are now effectively banned on federal land in California and similar states.” Can’t ban the guns? Go after the ammo.

The good news is that what Obama did by the pen can die by the pen. In other words: Donald Trump can easily roll back this unconstitutional provision. In any case, Obama’s last-minute swipe is just one of the many reasons he left the Oval Office with an average approval rating below that of even Richard Nixon. Hopefully, a Trump administration will also lead to a reversal in some states’ equally duplicitous ban on “armor piercing” rounds.