AG Jennings, coalition keep machine gun devices out of Delaware

Attorney General Kathy Jennings and a coalition of attorneys general have formalized an agreement to prevent the Trump Administration from distributing thousands of machine gun conversion devices into Delaware and other 16 other states.

In a notice of voluntary dismissal filed Friday, a coalition of AGs co-led by Delaware, New Jersey, and Maryland closed an earlier lawsuit against the Trump Administration-and in particular the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) , the U.S. Department of Justice, and several manufacturers and sellers of forced reset triggers (FRTs)-after securing the defendants' agreement not to return or sell thousands of seized FRTs in the coalition states, where they are illegal. FRTs dramatically increase firearms rate of fire and allow even novice shooters to attain the firepower of a military machine gun.

"This is a seismic public safety win for Delaware and for all of the states in this coalition," said Attorney General Kathy Jennings. "The federal government didn't just abdicate its law enforcement responsibility to police these devices-it was prepared to actively flood our communities with weapons of war capable of firing hundreds of bullets per minute. They would have killed innocent people, period. This lawsuit stopped them. I'm grateful to our sister states and their teams who helped prevent catastrophe in our neighborhoods."

The coalition filed their initial Complaint on June 9, 2025, followed by a Motion for Preliminary Injunction on June 10 and an Amended Complaint on July 7. In response, the federal defendants and defendants associated with the only FRT manufacturer to whom the ATF had returned FRTs, Rare Breed Triggers, LLC ("the RBT Defendants"), provided a sworn statement to the Court committing not to return FRTs into the plaintiff states and offering FRT owners in those states three options:

1. FRT owners may request that ATF transfer the device to them in a state where it is legal to possess.
2. FRT owners may request that ATF transfer the device to a third party in a state where it is legal to possess
3. FRT owners may withdraw the request for the return and abandon the device to ATF, in which case ATF would destroy the abandoned property without compensation and in accordance with federal law.

Under options 1 and 2, the FRT must remain in a state where the devices are legal. It is illegal to possess FRTs in Delaware or to transport FRTs into Delaware. Violations range from misdemeanors punishable from 6 months in prison and/or a $1,150 fine for a first offender, up to Class E felonies punishable by up to 5 years in prison for repeat offenders.

The Federal Defendants have since provided information confirming that the ATF is nearing completion of the returns and has adhered to the commitments it made in response to Motion for Preliminary Injunction and is drawing its return efforts to a close. The Federal Defendants have not returned FRTs to any Defendants other than the RBT Defendants. The RBT Defendants have not sold or returned FRTs into Delaware since providing their sworn statement, and their website states they do not ship FRTs into Delaware or any of the plaintiff states. AG Jennings and the coalition have agreed to dismiss this action without prejudice, reserving the right to file a new action challenging any attempt by Defendants to return or distribute FRTs into Plaintiff States.

In recent years, machine gun conversion devices (MCDs) have frequently been used in violent crimes and mass shootings, worsening the gun violence epidemic. Firearms equipped with these devices are able to approach or even exceed the rate of fire of many military machine guns, firing up to 20 bullets in one second. ATF has noted a significant rise in the use of MCDs, leading to increasing incidents of machine gun fire - up 1,400% from 2019 through 2021.

AG Jennings co-led this lawsuit together with the attorneys general of New Jersey and Maryland. They were joined by the attorneys general of California, Colorado, Hawai'i, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and the District of Columbia.