Trump's Call for Bump Stock Regulations

I'm sure that many of you have already seen reports from one media outlet or another that Trump has directed the Department of Justice to issue regulations banning bump stocks. This article from PJ Media relates:

        Trump said more than 100,000 public comments were received during the Justice Department's rulemaking period that ended Jan. 25. Today's memo directed the DOJ "to dedicate all available resources to complete the review of the comments received, and, as expeditiously as possible, to propose for notice and comment a rule banning all devices that turn legal weapons into machineguns." 

         "Although I desire swift and decisive action, I remain committed to the rule of law and to the procedures the law prescribes," said the president's memo. "Doing this the right way will ensure that the resulting regulation is workable and effective and leaves no loopholes for criminals to exploit."

Trump is generally careful not to alienate his base, but he also likes to give his opponents plenty of rope with which to hang themselves. Trump knows that the ATF has already reviewed this issue before and concluded that the bump stocks did not convert a rifle into a "machine gun" as that term is defined under the law, so I have a hard time believing that he expects that it will somehow be different this time absent some, shall we say, "creativity" on the part of the ATF. He also is not the type that cedes anything to the opposition without gaining something in return, which makes me leery of concluding that he has simply rolled over to the gun-grabbers. Yet his direction to the Department of Justice is clear. So, either he has concluded that his base (speaking as whole) doesn't really care about the bump-stock issue and he can use it as a sop to the Progressives, or he believes that he can somehow use this to make his opponents look foolish, or he believes that it opens the door to some other advantage, or some combination thereof.

        I will say this: if there is a regulation, no matter how badly it mauls the definition of "machine gun", I fully expect it to be upheld by a court regardless of the logical and grammatical contortions necessary to do so. It is a trite saying that "bad facts make for bad law." And that is exactly what we are seeing.