A display of ‘ghost guns’ displayed by Attorney General Josh Shapiro’s office during a Capitol news conference on Monday, Dec. 16, 2019 (Capital-Star photo).
Delaware County Council has taken its first steps towards banning “ghost guns.” The unserialized firearms can be manufactured using 3d-printed pieces or from kits containing parts that can be purchased without a background check. The law would also ban converters, often known as “Glock switches,” that can be used to turn a semi-automatic weapon into a fully automatic weapon..
If the ordinance passes, Delaware County will become the fifth or sixth local government in Pennsylvania to ban ghost guns, despite the commonwealth’s preemption laws that generally keep municipalities from enacting gun measures stricter than what exists in state code.
But, the state Supreme Court is expected to rule soon on whether or not the ghost gun bans can stand.
“The most sacred duty an elected official has is to keep our public safe,” said Richard Womack, vice chair of the Delaware County Council. “This ordinance helps to do that in a balanced, smart way that maintains public freedoms while keeping ensured public safety.”
The ordinance introduced Wednesday would entirely ban the manufacturing, sale and possession of ghost guns, except by people with a federal firearm license (FFL). It would also ban conversion devices entirely, as well as the sale or transfer of firearm finishing devices like mills or jigs used to convert frames or receivers into fully assembled guns. Violations could result in a $1000 fine or up to 10 days in jail.
In Erie, another proposed ghost gun ban had a first reading at a city council meeting on the same day.
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“What is a ghost gun?”
In the last decade, ghost guns have surged in popularity around the country. A study by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) found between 2017 and 2023, the number of untraceable ghost guns recovered at crime scenes rose by 1600%. Similarly, the number of machine gun converters recovered grew by 784% between 2019 and 2023.
As it stands, ghost guns are at the center of legal controversy both in Pennsylvania and the country more broadly.
“First off, what is a ghost gun?” said Stephen Gutowski, founder and editor of the independent news outlet, The Reload, which focuses on firearms. “It’s sort of a colloquial term that means a gun without a serial number.”
Broadly, Gutowski says, ghost guns are in three categories. First, there are guns manufactured before 1968, the year federal law required serial numbers for firearm sales. Those are legal for anyone who isn’t disqualified from gun ownership by their criminal or mental health record. Then, there are firearms with filed off or destroyed serial numbers, which are illegal to tamper with.
The third category is generally what people refer to when they use the term today: homemade guns.
“Obviously, homemade guns have been around forever,” Gutowski said. “However, it’s become increasingly attainable for the average person to make their own firearms for the last 10 to 15 years, really with the advent of 3D printing and Polymer 80% lowers.”
Polymer80 is a now-bankrupt company that made DIY ghost gun kits, which could be purchased unserialized and without a background check. The kits contained unfinished frames or receivers — the parts of a gun that are defined as a firearm by law — along with jigs and drillbits that could be used to complete it at home with common tools. Other parts of a gun can also be purchased without a background check.
“People have increasingly taken to making their own firearms at home with modern technologies that make the process easier for hobbyists,” Gutowski said. “These can also be appealing to criminals because one of the effects is it makes it more difficult to figure out the chain of custody of the gun — where it came from and how it got to a crime scene.”
Under former President Joe Biden, the ATF attempted to curb the use of ghost guns by passing a rule redefining what constitutes a firearm to include 80% kits. The U.S. Supreme Court has heard oral arguments on whether that rule is legal, and is expected to rule soon. In the meantime, it’s been allowed to stand.
It was by making the opposite argument — that a ghost gun kit is emphatically not a gun, but just a part of one — that Philadelphia justified passing their own ghost gun ban. It was done despite a Pennsylvania law that generally blocks local governments from enacting any gun regulation more restrictive than what’s in state code.
While numerous lawmakers in Harrisburg have attempted to ban ghost guns, no law has been passed on the state level.
Last year, the Commonwealth Court upheld Philadelphia’s ghost gun ban, but the decision has been appealed to the state Supreme Court. Other cities, including York, Reading and Harrisburg, have not been deterred from instituting their own bans. City Councillors in Erie also introduced a ban this week.
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“You can not live freely if you are living in fear.”
Adam Garber, the executive director of the anti-gun violence advocacy group CeaseFirePA, applauded the move towards banning ghost guns and conversion devices at the Delaware County council meeting.
Speaking to the ban on converters that allow weapons to fire automatically, Garber said, “rather than waiting for when it’s already attached to a firearm, it will help us prevent the shootings ahead of time, rather than to respond after a violent act is actually occurring.”
When it came to ghost guns, he added the rule, if passed, would also “create a second safeguard in case we see federal rollbacks that undermine the current protections that are in place.”
It’s unclear yet whether the Trump administration, which is broadly expected to take a more permissive stance on guns, will attempt to reverse the Biden-era ghost gun rule at the center of the pending Supreme Court decision.
Delaware County Council members expressed support for the ban.
“When unlicensed, unregistered, non-serialized firearms can be assembled and obtained by anyone with a 3d printer or access to a mail order kit, it is a danger that we cannot ignore,” said Delaware County Council Chair Monica Taylor. “When anyone can obtain a small part that modifies a firearm to be a fully-automatic tool of destruction, it is a danger that we can not ignore.“
Speaking to concerns raised by some Second Amendment advocates, Council member Elaine Schafer said, “Nothing in this ordinance limits the freedom of law-abiding citizens. To the contrary, the proliferation of these ghost guns and untraceable and elevated fire accelerators circulating around our community makes us all less safe. It makes us all less free. You can not live freely if you are living in fear.”
The law will require a second reading by the council before it passes. They’re scheduled to meet again on April 2.