Fake News: Media and Politians Get 3D Printing Gun Stories Upside-Down

Glock frame being completed with files not covered by federal injunction

More Fake News from the ignorant and biased media. A brief recap:

In 2013, the State Department, in the Barack Obama administration, unilateraly declared that posting computer code that could be used to print 3D firearm components, violated the vague International Traffic in Arms Regulations. This was new law, and had not been done before.

In 2015 Defense Distributed and the Second Amendment Foundation filed a lawsuit against the State Department for violating their First Amendment rights.

In 2018 the State Department agreed to a legal settlement of the lawsuit, because they did not believe they could win in court.

Afraid of the exercise of First and Second Amendment rights, attorneys from 20 states sued the State Department to prevent the legal settlement with Defense Distributed  from taking effect. They used the Constitutionally dubious method of judge shopping to find one of 600 federal district judges that agreed with them.
Retired senior Federal District Judge Lasnik of Seattle agreed to hear the case and issued a permanent injunction against Defense Distributed, from posting the computer files on the Internet.

It was, is, and always has been, legal for anyone in the United States to possess such files and to use them within the law, under the First and Second Amendments. Moreover, those files have been on the Internet for five years.

They are available here now.

Here is how it was reported by  WFMJ in Ohio. From wfmj.com:

If you live in Pennsylvania, you can't legally download a 3D blueprint for a gun.

After an emergency hearing in a Pennsylvania federal courtroom, Texas-based Defense Distributed agreed to block users in Pennsylvania from accessing and downloading 3D gun plans.

It also said it would not upload new files – for now.This temporary agreement comes after the U.S. State Department settled a lawsuit against the company to allow those gun plans to be put online.

Not only did they falsely report that it was illegal to download the 3D files, they falsely reported that the State Department settled a lawsuit against the company. The lawsuit was against the State Department.

Then, from Wired.com, we have the following.  From wired.com:

Wilson said that while the preliminary injunction forbade him to share the files online for free, it expressly allowed him to sell them. At a news conference Tuesday, Wilson periodically stopped talking to check his phone when a new sale came through.

This technicality, legal experts say, really does allow Wilson to sell his blueprints. The legally tricky part is verifying that his customers are all US citizens; if not, he'll be in violation of US export law.

The "technicality" that Wired.com refers to is the First Amendment of the Bill of Rights.  However, the statement from Josh Shapiro, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, puts Wired.com's fake news to shame.

 “Selling these files into Pennsylvania violates both our state law and the agreement Defense Distributed reached with the Commonwealth before Judge Diamond on July 29. Putting untraceable weapons in the hands of criminals presents a clear public safety threat to Pennsylvanians, which is why I am exploring all of my legal options to stop these sales,” said Pennsylvania attorney general Josh Shapiro in a statement to WIRED.

Josh Shapiro in the same paragraph says that selling these files into Pennsylvania violates state law, and that he is exploring all his legal options to stop the sales.

Sorry, Josh. You do not have the authority or the power to do so. Those files have been on the Internet for five years. The First Amendment prohibits you from censoring speech or the press as you so desperately wish to do.

Get ready for a lawsuit against you for violating civil rights under color of law, because that is exactly what you are doing.

It is legal in Pennsylvania for people to print their own guns, as long as the guns themselves are compliant with the state and federal laws.

The First and Second Amendments complement each other.

©2018 by Dean Weingarten: Permission to share is granted when this notice and link are included.
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