ATF DATA Act

This bill makes the Justice Department’s ATF put out a public, online report about guns that police recover and trace. The first report must come within 6 months of the law taking effect, and then at least once a year after that. The report also goes to Congress.

The report must include things like: the top 200 licensed gun sellers whose guns were most often traced, the cities where those guns were found, and how long it took from first sale to recovery (called “time-to-crime”) . It breaks down data by dealer type and state, including how many dealers had 1+, 5+, 10+, and more traced guns. It also looks at the 50 metro areas with the highest homicide rates (overall and per person), showing where the guns were first sold, which dealers sold them, the types of guns, and time-to-crime, using FBI crime data. The report covers guns sold in multiple sales, guns reported lost or stolen by dealers, privately made firearms, which police agencies ask for the most traces, guns recovered in other countries that were first sold in the U.S., and patterns in gun trafficking, including the role of sales by unlicensed people at gun shows or online .

Key points

• Who is affected: ATF (must publish data); licensed gun dealers (appear in aggregated trace statistics); police and the public (gain access to detailed info).
• What changes: A yearly, public report will show which dealers’ guns are most traced, where guns come from, time-to-crime, multiple-sales data, lost/stolen gun data, privately made firearm counts, foreign recoveries, and trafficking trends, including unlicensed sales at gun shows and online .
• When: First report within 6 months of enactment, then at least annually.