Police and prosecutors in New Mexico supported a campaign to ban tools turning handguns into machine guns. The governor of Alabama gave it top attention.
This year, legislators in both states—one run by Democrats, the other by Republicans—reacted with new legislation rendering so-called Glock swaps unlawful.
At least half of U.S. states now have comparable laws banning the ownership of such devices, a list that has expanded over the last decade as law enforcement officials have discovered more of the little yet strong gadgets linked to firearms.
States are copying federal law, which for decades has usually banned machine guns and any components that may turn semiautomatic weapons into automatic ones.
What is federal law?
U.S. law characterizes a machine gun as a weapon that single trigger pull mechanically shoots more than one shot. The definition also covers any components meant to turn a gun into a machine gun.
What does federal legislation say?
U.S. law characterizes a machine gun as a weapon that single trigger pull mechanically shoots more than one shot. The definition also covers any components meant to turn a gun into a machine gun.
Like a factory-made machine gun, a gun equipped with a switch may fire thousands of rounds in few seconds.
Other Glock-mimicking handgun brands can also be converted into machine guns. Some semiautomatic guns can thus as well. Such conversion devices are sometimes known as auto sears, selection switches, or chips.
What does the data show?
Auto sears’ use increased sharply in the last ten years, in part because 3D printers allow for cheap manufacture.
Between 2012 and 2016, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives seized just 814 machine gun conversion components. From 2017 to 2021, that grew to 5,454.
Former President Joe Biden’s administration stated in January that 12,360 suspected machine gun conversion devices had been found in the United States and sent to the ATF throughout a nearly 34-month period ending in October 2024.
Nearly half that number was accounted for by five states including Florida, Illinois, Texas, Montana and North Dakota.
What have states done?
The most recent state to ban Glock swaps is Alabama. Republican Gov. Kay Ivey’s measure enacted this month makes owning components used to turn handguns into machine guns a crime punishable by up to ten years in prison.
The bipartisan effort in Alabama followed police statements indicating conversion devices had been linked to deadly shootings, including one in September that left four dead and 17 others wounded outside a Birmingham bar.
In February, Democratic New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham signed legislation making ownership of a weapon conversion device a crime punishable by maximum three years in jail.
Similar laws currently moving to the Senate were approved last week by the New Jersey General Assembly. Other states are also waiting on bills.
Last year, Republican Virginia Governor Glenn Youngkin approved legislation outlawing vehicle sears. Youngkin, however, rejected last week’s bill that would have extended an already-existing prohibition on “trigger activators” to include other gadgets raising semiautomatic gun fire speeds.
What do supporters of gun control desire?
Organizations like Everytown for Gun Safety claim state laws offer a sometimes simpler option to federal punishment for owning Glock switches. But they wish to go farther.
Everytown for Gun Safety supports laws in California, Maryland and New York making it illegal to sell handguns capable of conversion into machine guns.
“That really puts the pressure where it belongs — on the manufactures that are making money off of guns that they know can be readily turned into machine guns,” said Nick Suplina, senior vice president for law and policy at Everytown for Gun Safety.
Glock has been sued by several cities and states including Baltimore, Chicago, Minnesota and New Jersey for producing handguns that others may turn into automatic weapons.
What do groups advocating for gun rights say?
The National Rifle Association points out that U.S. prosecutors may already prosecute anyone for abusing gun conversion devices without state law involvement.
Another gun-rights organization, Gun Owners of America, argues that individuals should have a Second Amendment right to possess machine guns. State laws prohibiting machine gun conversation devices, according to Aidan Johnston, federal relations director for Gun Owners of America, are “duplicative” and “pure virtue signaling.”
Guns changed to shoot automatically, he claimed, may be useful in real situations like wiping out big populations of wild hogs ruining property.