Very stupid question but jail is not fun.. So I am asking away. I am looking into a 9mm ar for my suppressor (links below) and probably will be holding that stock/buffer tube against my shoulder I would assume if I had it. So with a 10.5" barrel this doesn't make this an SBR does it? I was just reading about some ATF "anything touching the shoulder is a stock" quotes. Whats the word on this?

http://www.cheaperthandirt.com/product/3-0140060

http://palmettostatearmory.com/index.php/catalog/product/view/id/21427/s/psa-10-5-9mm-sqr-9-upper-with-bcg-and-charging-handle/category/4442/

so your constructive intent is to use the buffer tube as a stock...

No, they don't even come close to your shoulder unless you're a midget so its not even really possible, I just didn't know it was literally that small of a gray area. Knowing this I will SBR it but is it really that fine of a line? I mean the buffer tube touches your shoulder and its automatically an SBR just like that?

Paranoia!!
Just don't let it touch your shoulder when you may be in the company of a BATFE agent.  They wear dark blue windbreakers with large yellow ATF lettering on the back.

One non-lawyer ATF bureaucrat in an acting position has written that shouldering a brace attached to a pistol changes the classification of the firearm to SBR. He did not state that shouldering a buffer tube does the same.

- OS

again, its the intent, not the act of shouldering.

There's no such thing as constructive intent.  And it's design AND intent, you have to have both.  The receiver extension was never designed as a stock and it's dubious to think it could be "redesigned" as a one.  It's a weak argument.  However, the braces are a better argument.  It may be possible to redesign a brace as a stock.  But no one will know until it ends up in court.

I'm sorry but I don't know.
No one really knows. It's just the ATF and their usual tactics.

Nope, as far as braces, that was the original opinions coming out of the ATF loon tank -- now according to Mad Max Kingery, the mere act of doing it at all with a brace changes the classification. Period. And supersedes all previous opinions.

Intent vs practice regarding doing same with buffer tube only is debatable, as it has not been exactly addressed one way or the other, other than of course that an AR direct impingement pistol must have a buffer tube to function, so is of course not construed as a stock.

- OS

An AR needs a buffer tube to function. It doesn't need a brace. Same reason a two-handed grip on a pistol does not an AOW make, but a VFG does.

lets not forget when the feds tried to nail someone for constructive intent they lost the case and it was a much better test of the whole "constructive intent" thing.

i was told by a fellow further along in years than myself that told me the first ar-  "pistols" were just car stocks pinned at the closed position.

thats what it should be


is the  contraption capable of firing in proper high power us marine rifle positions like this?

no?

then its not a rifle !



thats what i think, sadly i have put my sig brace aside as i dont even want some cop or dogooder getting on to me.

hell the range can get out of hand with the "help".

Thank you! I get sick of hearing people spread the myth...in fear of something that doesnt exist.

Since you own the brace I am guessing you have seen most of the ATF letters but I believe I saw an article recently from the ATF approving the brace. Don't quote me on that but might be worth the research. I still wouldn't personally use it for your same reasoning though.

Just make sure that if you "redesigned" something to work one way, when you are done just "redesigned" back to what it was before. Use a wrench to pound a nail in, "redesigning" it into a hammer. Then use that same wrench to tighten a bolt so it is "redesigned" back into being a wrench. Unless you just want to keep pounding in nails with the wrench, then it can stay a hammer. Then have a buddy come over and ask him to pass you the hammer. When he fails to pass you the wrench, give him a look like his is nuts. Then ask him to tighten a bolt for you and yell at him for using the wrench, because it has clearly been "redesigned" to be a hammer.

That is a humorous take on the ambiguities of how things are redesigned based on use and not actual design.  The ATF considers "Chore Boy" a suppressor if used for the purpose of making a gun quieter.  They may have an argument.   The other problem is that short barreled rifles are a one way street into the NFA.  The irony is that if you're going to redesign your Sig pistol into a short barreled rifle, you might as well turn it into a machine gun.  Same penalties.  

And that may well be the argument if one is ever arrested for casual use as a stock.  If someone really had "intent" to make an NFA firearm, the logical choice would not be short barreled rifle.  But that's just my opinion.  I think machine gun is greater than short barreled rifle even though statute says they are equal (well except you can have new short barreled rifles but not a new machine gun).

The SIG Brace is entirely legal to use - as a wrist brace attached to your forearm. I would hazard a guess that others with letters are equally legal - as a wrist brace held against the forearm.

The ATF published a letter months ago saying that holding it against your shoulder is NOT a legal use.

The interesting part is that is as far as it goes. Their plate is full catching bad guys who are really trying to do illegal stuff, so their focus is on real convictions in court. As pointed out in this thread and half a dozen others since the open letter came out, the local Range Nazi and other ATF quislings are doing most of the work repressing our rights to shoot pistols. Even posting up a picture here will be an issue, as "criminal activity" is not supported here.

The ATF doesn't need to prosecute with every Tom, Dick, and Harry running around doing their dirty work for them.

Just wait until the ITAR restrictions are passed and most of the technical forums are shut down. Apparently nobody cares about that, tho, they would rather obsess about skirting the NFA with questionably legal products.

Many of us will not go SBR - a stock is just an accessory to tighten up aim on long range targets, and Pistols are not 400m optimal choices. More like max 125m, and even an 8MOA shot will still hit an 18MOA center of mass target whether deer or human. Just spend the money on ammo and range time to learn how to do it, same as the guys who hit steel with handguns. The AR pistol isn't a monster to shoot compared to a magnum pistol. It's just harder to conceal.

If you hold it against your shoulder and don't shoot it, is it a SBR?
What if there's no bolt in it?
What if.........?
Where does this all end?

It is worthwhile to note the ATF publised an opinion letter months ago, not a ruling.  

Whether or not that opinion letter will be enforceable is yet to be seen so far as I know.  How one can prove intent + deal with the 'design/redesign' semantics hasn't seen a courtroom that I am aware of.  Yet it is common lore that if you picked up a pistol and put it to your shoulder you have now committed a felony.

Not until you've been charged and successfully convicted...

That's a really good point.  It's not a Justice Department ruling like this one:

https://www.atf.gov/file/55526/download

What is the difference between a letterhead ruling from the Justice Department and a open letter from the Enforcement body?  It's interesting they're both published in the same place.

https://www.atf.gov/file/11816/download

I doubt there's much difference since the enforcement body is the first level of government interaction.  At a minimum, you're significantly less wealthy with either document, I'd imagine.  

The ATF is delegated regulatory power by Congress to decide these issues, and the regulations are considered law in the absence of any other guidelines. Congress did that to keep stuff off their plate in the minutia of enforcement. Same as DOT, EPA, etc.

The ATF gets convictions based on what they wrote as regulation. Same as above.

As for a buffer tube, the open letter wasn't focused on that. Therefore drawing a conclusion from reading it may not apply. However, if the ATF wants, they could refer to it. That's how it works. At present their is an FOIA to make public ALL the letters the ATF has written, to pin them down and expose discrepancies. What they wrote for one circumstance has been shown to be illogical with others.

Consider the stance necessary to look down pistol sights with any part of it held to the shoulder - it's not good. The head must be tilted to one side to make contact with the tube, the rear sight is extremely close - ok if you shoot nose to the charging handle - and the weapon is held out in front of you 90 degrees to the chest. There is a line of thinking that sees it as being all wrong.

Try it with a sling, pushing out against it, held parallel across the chest, head upright. AR's in 5.56 have minimal recoil, you can shoot them against your chin with no ill effect. It's a short range weapon used on 18MOA targets - think about it, an 18" square torso target, and the goal is to get a hit in the black. That's an 18" 10 ring. Hits count - a hit is a bullet in a torso. A hit is a definite reduction in the combat ability of the opponent. We don't need 1/4" bug hole accuracy, folks, and it's a fools errand to insist on it when the target is so large.

Don't bring precision long gun expectations to a short range man on man confrontation, and you can use a pistol to it's full effect legally without having to poke the bear. Learn how to shoot it the way it is. It's plenty good enough.

So you're suggesting they're equal weight?  I'm thinking one is a legal interpretation and the other is an enforcement opinion.  They may have equal weight from an enforcement perspective but it's unlikely they have equal weight in court.  The ATF is winging it on this one and they're on some shaky ground.  I don't think the letter rises to the level of legal opinion.  It's obfuscation and scare, but they can arrest for anything so really nothing new.    

That being said, the braces should never have been allowed in the first place.  If they were allowed because of the American Disabilities Act, they should have been ruled a medical appliance by prescription only.  Now because of this, one has to be alert if shouldering a gun that isn't a rifle (that's an extreme point of view but that's what essentially they've declared).  "You can shoot it this way but we'll fuck with you if you shoot it that way", to me, isn't an acceptable policy.  On certain things I can understand that concept (for instance sniffing paint fumes or sniffing glue).   I just don't see the harm in shooting a pistol by various methods if an actual crime has not been committed.   And that's what they should make clear.  If they are going to make that leap, it should only be a short barreled rifle in the commission of a crime.   Ultimately, that's probably what they are suggesting; it would be a tack on charge.  But as for now, we have a state of confusion to the point where we have people acting as their minions (including the operators of this board).  I can live with "don't ask, don't tell" but I don't have to like it.  

I'm not a fan of the braces because I don't have a use for them and because they open the door for an added layer of confusion that didn't exist prior.  However, if this is a "don't ask, don't tell" policy which gives folks the right to obtain a psuedo-SBR where they otherwise couldn't, then kudos for the ATF for doing so.  I can say the same for the Slide Fire stock for it's pseudo-machine gun function.

As we wade through the implementation of Federal Administrative Law (i.e. when the ATF uses its legislatively delegated power/responsibility to regulate it is doing so under administrative law) it is important that folks know what was written vs what is flying around the internet.  A lot of things don't have easy definitions or clarity to them; i.e. the difference between a ruling (making law) and an opinion (interpretation of existing law) is a bit odd for the layperson.  Never mind that when you go the ATF to find the open letter it is actually titled 'All_FFLs_Jan2015...' but its opening paragraph notes that it is to answer questions from repeated public inquiries (this is why we can't have nice things, b/c we keep asking someone for permissions...).  

I've always wondered how this is actually enforceable since their letter talks about intent and redesign (using the 'common sense' definition of predesignation which is“to alter the appearance or function of.” based off Websters New College Dictionary, Third Ed (2005)).  

Goes to my point: has anyone actually been arrested for this?  Has anyone been convicted?  To not go quite as far, I wonder how many folks who post with certainty about the opinion letter have ever talked to someone in the ATF on the enforcement side about the likelihood of arrest/conviction.  

All the Gadsden flags running around and yet we as a community seem to run for cover at times.  But that's just my opinion!

No. Would be big news in the gun world. It's my opinion that ATF does not want to  either, preferring to just let it remain within its tradition of intimidation.

Last time they took on an issue like this, they lost beau coup discretion with arrest/enforcement power they had previously asserted (Thompson decision).

Also, there has never been a conviction for their vertical forward grip on pistol stance - the one time they tried, pretrial opinion from the court wasn't favorable, and they dropped the charge rather than continue to trial, so no case law precedent was set.

- OS

Concur, in fact friends I know in the enforcement side of the ATF basically think all of this is retarded and have bigger things on their mind than someone shouldering a pistol with a brace.  

No, not even close.  In fact, only one or two guys have ever been charged with possession of an SBR without a stamp.  In those cases the guns were used in crimes so it was a tacked on charge.  There has NEVER been a case of someone at a range firing an AR pistol and being approached by the ATF and ordered to submit the firearm for inspection.  The ATF just doesn't really seem to care about stuff like this.  Gun guys obsess over these silly laws that no one has ever tried to enforce and few LEO even know about.  I get that people are scared of prison or whatever but a lot of people get really neurotic about it.

Ask your friends in the ATF if they would be able to 'look the other way' if someone were to be iPotato filmed shouldering a 'pistol with a brace' while taking out a mad-man.

I've read posts on this sparatically and don't think I've seen one yet that I really agreed with.

Such a cluster. Reason why I gave up caring.

So as a hypothetical your concern is that someone will use a pistol in a fashion that the tech branch made an opinion letter on in an illegal fashion, while being filmed, to stop someone during the conduct of a crime-and then be charged-by the ATF?

I could ask them, they'd probably say "what am I, an asshole?"

All of which goes to the point that we police ourselves a lot more than anyone is doing for us.

Same here, I will use any weapon I have, anyway I need to in order to save myself or my family and property, I will also train in various methods to ensure if that day ever came I would be prepared, no matter the outcome from the ATF or anything the government does to me after I have at the least saved myself and my loved ones.

(Every cop I have spoken to is of the mind you do as you feel fit, fuck the government-granted they are deputy's or State Po Po but at least I have the 2 that cover my AO)

Dude.

I just want you to put the question to them and report back.

No need to attack me, or tap dance around.

If you know these folks, put the question to them and report back.

Simple.

Same here.

I won't ask them that question, it's got too many hypotheticals and the answer would almost certainly be "we wouldn't take jurisdiction away from the municipality where the crime was committed, so I wouldn't look the other way but I also wouldn't do anything".  I already asked the question of 'what do you think about the potential enforcement of the sig brace stuff' as a much broader question to get a sense of what their thought was awhile back as the internet was on fire about it.  The response was "I can't get the AUSA to let me charge legitimate criminals using firearms even though their felons, do you think any of us care about someone shouldering an AR pistol?" (with follow on discussion about the delta between enforcement and tech.)

I wasn't attacking you-I was relating more/less exactly what my colleagues say when things like that come out of the interweb.  I'm not calling it definitive of course, but I think this thread's discussion about if you are the one committing a crime and use an AR pistol in the conduct of it than standby, it will be an additional charge to pile onto all that is going to make life tough.  Otherwise, I return back to the reality that in the months since the open opinion letter was released I know of nobody that's been charged with illegal possession of an SBR after shouldering one.

Fair enough.

Thanks for putting the effort into this reply.

Stop posting questions like this in a public forum, for starters.

Just hold it 1000th of an inch away from your shoulder.  If it hits it accidentally you had no intent.  Really with the government loosing track of countless guns in new Mexico and   Everything else going on.  I wish the only thing they had to worry about is if I shouldered my pistol.

I too spoke to a buddy of mine who is an ATF SRT agent. One of the tac team guys. Not a policy-maker by any stretch, but he said what many of us already know...the agency has much bigger fish to fry, and nobody is going to get prosecuted for anything related to a Sig brace, stabilizer, etc in this current very gun-friendly environment. Right now gun rights and support for broadening them is at an all time high whether it feels like it or not. He commented that most of his range time is at agency ranges, shoot-houses, etc, but he occasionally shoots at public ranges and almost always sees people shooting all manner of "illegal" weapons, NONE of which he has ever thought twice about making a fuss over.

If shouldering it "redesigns" it into an SBR, then my intent is to swing it about on occasion, thus "redesigning" it into a club, not a firearm at all and therefore not any of the ATFs bidnez.

In that instance and by the logic they used to come to their ruling.  You are using it as  a stock (why else would you shoulder it) therefore it is being used as an SBR.  It has absolutely nothing to do with if it actually is a stock and everything to do with manner and intent of use.  And I'm speaking to how they would consider charging you not as to if it hakes the slightest sense at all which it doesn't.





 

No, it has to be "designed, made AND intended" or "redesigned, remade AND intended".   You have to have all three, it's not just intent.  The receiver extension was never designed to be shouldered.  And shouldering it cannot redesign it because it's an integral part for the function of the gun.   It's probably possible to redesign a brace for use as a stock because it's not part of the function of the gun.  But you can't redesign the receiver extension without unmaking the gun.  There is a relationship to all three of the actions for creating a rifle.  You can't turn a Glock or Peacemaker into a rifle by pressing it against your shoulder and firing,  It's still a pistol or a revolver.

The term “rifle” means a weapon designed or redesigned, made or remade, and intended to be fired from the shoulder and designed or redesigned and made or remade to use the energy of the explosive in a fixed cartridge to fire only a single projectile through a rifled bore for each single pull of the trigger, and shall include any such weapon which may be readily restored to fire a fixed cartridge.

The whole redesign brace crap is BS, the ATF changed their stance on it.

Read that definition. It is not the individual part that is the design element but the firearm as a whole. If you design, build and intend the bare buffer tubed only firearm to be shoulder fired it is a rifle.
In other words if I decide that I'm going to build a "pistol" because I can shoulder the buffer tube so I don't need a stock, I have decided that the firearm is intended to be fired from my shoulder, I have "designed it" to be shoulder fired by using the buffer tube as a stock, I have built it and I intend it to be shoulder fired. So I have not built a pistol, I have built a rifle. In this case, by MY design and MY intent I have "remade or redesigned" that buffer tube as a stock.
This is the crux of the much ballyhooed letter. Read the letter carefully, it never once states that you cannot fire your pistol from your shoulder. It states that using a brace to as a shoulder stock is redesigning the brace. Using the brace as a shoulder stock, as in installing it with the intention of using it as a stock, which is exactly what 99.7% of the people who bought and installed the stock did.  





It even states as much in the next paragraph, "Any person who intends to use a handgun stabilizing brace as a shoulder stock on a pistol (having a rifled barrel under 16 inches in length or a smooth bore firearm with a barrel under 18 inches in length) must first file an ATF Form 1 and pay the applicable tax because the resulting firearm will be subject to all provisions of the NFA."



Now obviously the ATF can't know what the builders intentions are. But it didn't have to, thousands of people wrote them asking if it was ok to use as a stock. This letter is the answer to all those questions. Using it as a stock, not simply firing your pistol from your shoulder, but using it as a stock, installing it to be used as a stock is the redesigning part.
 

And that's why we have judges.   I can accept the premise that a brace can be redesigned as a stock.  I can't accept the premise that a receiver extension that was designed not to accept a stock so there would be less ambiguity for constructive possession can somehow be redesigned as a stock.  To me, there's a separation between design and intent; otherwise, there would be no need for "design" to be part of the definition.

Indeed but the design is of the firearm not the individual pieces that make up that firearm. Often the use of an item defines what it is, or has become.


If you take that same buffer tube and use it to beat the snot out of your neighbor you will be charged with assault with a deadly weapon. That buffer tube was never designed to be a deadly weapon, you changed it buy the way you used it. Also without the designed part in the definition any firearm you intend to fire from your shoulder would fit the rifle definition. So you must design it and intend it to be shoulder fired. But you are the one designing it, not the person that designed the part. If that part is what you are using as a stock in your design then a stock it is regardless of it's original purpose or design.





Now obviously the brace or the tube can never be 100% proven that you designed and made your firearm intending it to be shoulder fired, unless you admit it (or post about it in a public forum). But you may have a much harder time convincing anyone why you installed a device intended as a brace for disabled persons (which is why it was designed and approved) if your a fully able-bodied than explaining why a buffer tube is on your AR pistol.  In either case the chances of being prosecuted is slim to none, although it could cost you a good amount of money to hear you are free to go.





 

The other hole in the logic stated by InExile is that a rifle is an SBR or it is not an SBR. A short barreled rifle with a STOCK on it is an SBR -- always, no matter who is possessing it.

Yet a pistol with a brace on it, which is NOT a STOCK, becomes an SBR when fired from the shoulder. Max Max is clear about that, it must be FIRED from the SHOULDER to become illegal.

Now, is it only an SBR while fired from the shoulder, or does it now become an SBR permanently? Does it remain an SBR when sold to someone else? Is it illegal to sell it to someone else as a GCA firearm after you've fired it from the shoulder, and illegal for that owner to possess without a stamp? Etc.

All absurd contentions IMNSHO.

ATF does NOT want this in court, where undoubtedly they will lose, on any number of precepts. "Thought crime" and "unreasonable and unenforceable" concepts alone should do it.

And just think how simple it would have been if ATF had simply designated these thingies as "stocks". The design could be quite easily changed so that they were completely usable for the claimed purpose but not practically usable as stocks.

In which case 100 people or fewer would have bought one. I still think it was SIG's influence as a gummit contractor that got the tacit go ahead on the SB-15 in it's final form -- if OhShoot Enterprises had made it, or even Alex Bosco's company, they would have nixed it, as anyone can see it's clearly more of a stock than the approved prototype.

- OS

There's no design requirement for deadly weapon.  The weapon was created by intent.  That's the BATF's big problem.  By their interpretation, they would be able to turn any legal firearm arm into an illegal one with intent.  And if that were the case, the Slide Fire stock would surely turn any rifle into a machine gun.  Their problem is that it doesn't meet the design constraint for machine gun even though everyone is purchasing a Slide Fire stock to create a machine gun.  If one was to interpret the meaning of design as it relates to machine gun (which would be a logical argument), you could never get to use for the redesign as it relates to rifles.  That's how I look at it.  

Best response winner

This is absolutely not stated anywhere at any time and I ask you to cite the reference for this statement.  It is stated that using a brace as a stock is redesigning and as such turns the firearm into a NFA firearm. The use is not in the act of firing it from the shoulder. The use come from installing a brace as part of the design of the weapon with the intent to build a shoulder fired weapon, which is in fact what most of the buyers did. They bought it and installed it as a "loophole" to building a SRB without the tax. They designed their firearm with the intent of using the brace to shoulder fire the firearm, that is the very definition of a rifle. Because they did so with a barrel under 16" or an OAL under 26" they built an untaxed SBR.



The letter states using it as a stock, not simply bracing your pistol against your shoulder. If the latter were the case then anything braced against your shoulder when firing would be "redesigning" it as a stock; even the buffer tube itself as either were never "designed" to be stocks.





 

I don't get your drift at all.

I said:
"Yet a pistol with a brace on it, which is NOT a STOCK, becomes an SBR when fired from the shoulder. Max Max is clear about that, it must be FIRED from the SHOULDER to become illegal."

Mad Max says:

"The pistol stabilizing brace was neither “designed” nor approved to be used as a shoulder stock, and therefore use as a shoulder stock constitutes a “redesign” of the device because a possessor has changed the very function of the item."

"Any person who intends to use a handgun stabilizing brace as a shoulder stock on a pistol (having a rifled barrel under 16 inches in length or a smooth bore firearm with a barrel under 18 inches in length) must first file an ATF Form 1 and pay the applicable tax because the resulting firearm will be subject to all provisions of the NFA."

So, "using" a brace as a stock, means holding it against your shoulder while you fire the gun. The "not a stock" becomes a "stock", ie makes it an SBR, yes? Is that somehow too simplistic a definition of what Max says? Jeez, you seem to think Max is delving into some sort of higher plane metaphysical concept here.

- OS

No not at all. I'm saying the "use" referred to is in installing it with the intention of using it to shoulder fire. That is using it as a shoulder stock, not the simple act of holding it to your shoulder. If what your saying, simply the act of bracing it against your shoulder is the "use" referred to in the letter then anything, including the buffer tube itself, would constitute the "redesigning" when braced against your shoulder and result in the making of a NFA firearm.
Look at your own posted quote, "Any person who intends to use a handgun stabilizing brace as a shoulder stock
on a pistol (having a rifled barrel under 16 inches in length or a
smooth bore firearm with a barrel under 18 inches in length) must first
file an ATF Form 1 and pay the applicable tax because the resulting
firearm will be subject to all provisions of the NFA."
To use a brace as a stock you must FIRST file a form 1 because the resulting firearm will be subject to the NFA.  A firearm cannot meet any NFA definition based solely on how it is held when fired. There are hard codified, legally defined parameters that must be met to be classified a NFA firearm. In the case of a SBR it must be designed (redesigned) made(remade) and intended to be a shoulder fired weapon have a barrel(barrels) less that 16" or an OAL less that 26". The only way a brace equipped firearm can meet those parameters is if the brace was installed and intended to be used in the design of a shoulder fired weapon. Only in such a case can the brace be classified as "used as a shoulder stock".
You also state above "Max is clear about that, it must be FIRED from the SHOULDER to become illegal." Nowhere has he or anyone in any official capacity ever stated that "it must be FIRED from the SHOULDER to become illegal."
You give way too much credit of this letter to Max. He did not write the letter he simply signed it. The letter was drafted by a team of ATF lawyers who left the wording so ambiguous and obtuse to cause the exact reaction it has without ever actually saying it is illegal to hold a pistol to your shoulder and fire it, which it is absolutely, unequivocally  not.
 

Well, if your first intention is to use it as a brace then you can install it.  Once it's installed, it doesn't become a rifle even if at some point you intend to change your mind and redesign it as a stock.  You can't mentally turn a pistol into a rifle by thinking about intending to redesign it.  Also, it's not a pistol or sbr if you put a 16" upper on it and use it as a stock (it can still be a pistol if you don't shoulder fire).  In that case, it's only a rifle stock if you fire from the shoulder in a legal configuration.  Once you put the pistol lower back on, it can still be a brace even though you intend to use it as a stock with a 16" upper.  In either of these cases, it's only a stock or a brace when fired.

I agree that Max has not talked about firing from the shoulder but I also agree that use in this case would mean only when fired with intention.

?? Holding a pistol to your shoulder to fire is okay. Holding a pistol with a brace on it to your shoulder to fire is not okay, that is the subject. He clearly says that "use" "redesigns" it, eh? "Use as a shoulder stock". Regardless of all this "intention" crap. USING it as a shoulder stock is illegal without a stamp according to Max. What is use? Putting it against your shoulder and firing the weapon, of course, what else?

And yes, I realize that this "intention" thing has been your take on the USC all along, and that it does not mention the word "stock", though I think it was more due to poor diction, since "intent" is not a crime unless it rises to the level of "attempt", at least until we have Minority Report technology and legislation. Meaning, it must rise to the constructive level of making a shoulder fired weapon, which de facto still means having a stock. Whatever, not debating that any more, if it ever goes though the court system, I'm sure that will be sussed out one way or the other.

But what's clear is that traditionally, a rifle has been ruled by ATF on the basis of having a stock, and having a stock or not having a stock has been the only real difference between an AR rifle and an AR pistol. Which is why ATF has always taken such pains to determine if anything on the ass end of the thing is a stock or not.

But now due to the advent of the brace, even though ATF decided it is not a stock,  we have a different bent.  

- Previously, "brace is not a stock and legal to fire from shoulder",
- Now, "brace is not a stock but illegal if intended to be used for fire from shoulder". Though it's near impossible to prove intent (if indeed intent were verified as a crime) when the brace was installed, you can sure prove it when actually used, assuming that is the new letter of the law for enforcement. But of course Max is not relying on intent in this case, as I'm sure he'd also maintain that the usage has "re-designed" the thing also.

I'm only saying this is now a difference in how ATF at least threatens to enforce the matter,  as it has never before given a hoot about one's original intentions nor how the results were used regarding SBR, as long as the stand alone configuration passed its muster.

- OS