Come January 1, 2026, California gun owners will have yet another set of hoops to jump through as Governor Newsom continues his relentless pursuit of law-abiding citizens. The new law, ostensibly to impede (not stop) the manufacture of 3D-printed guns via a proof of age restriction and mandatory verification that the recipient of parts and pieces (more in a minute) will not “manufacture” without a manufacturing license, more than three firearms per year.
As usual, it’s unclear if the law considers changing a trigger “manufacturing” but that’s typical of the broad, yet shallow, lengths anti-gun legislators will use to make life more difficult for law-abiding citizens. Criminals, as everyone except politicians apparently know, aren’t bothered by regulations.
If you’re selling online accessories, you can either wait for a positive digital confirmation of age or ship the accessory to an FFL for a scheduled pickup where the FFL will be required to do the age verification.
Essentially, the new law is more than an age verification to impede “ghost gun” manufacturing, it’s actually designed to slow-if not stop- sales of repair or replacement parts and tools to work on firearms. It also creates a de-facto gun registry. While California won’t have the names of all gun owners, it will certainly have a listing (registry) of everyone who bought gun parts.
Interestingly, Californians don’t have to provide a government identification to vote (a utility bill will suffice), but you’ll need to provide a license or other identification to buy a gunsmith’s hammer or screwdriver.
The law expands the definition of a firearms accessory to “mean an attachment or device designed or adapted to be inserted into, affixed onto, or used in conjunction with a firearm that is designed, intended or functions to increase a firearm’s rate of fire or to increase the speed at which a person may reload a firearm or replace the magazine., or any other attachment or device described in subdivision (a) of Section 30515 of the Penal Code that may render a firearm an assault weapon when inserted into, affixed onto, or used in conjunction with a firearm. The term firearm accessory also includes any other device, tool, kit, part, or parts set that is clearly designed and intended for use in manufacturing firearms.”
Essentially, this rather broad (and vague) interpretation includes virtually anything except possibly reloading, cleaning and other gun gear (does a magazine pouch enable you to reload faster?).
The requirements for a seller aren’t designed to streamline the checkout process. It will require
- notice on manufacturing if receiving firearms pasts of accessories
- acknowledgement by customer of receipt and understanding of notice
- verification of proof of age- must be over 18
- Signature with clear and conspicuous markings on package stating “Signature and proof of identification of person aged 18 years or older required for delivery”
- Requirement that purchaser provide carrier with identification and sign for the package
- Address for delivery must match address on identification received for age verification.
Those requirements wouldn’t apply to delivery to an FFL, wholesaler, certain law enforcement and military. The requirements also don’t apply to the carriers transporting the products.
I asked my UPS driver how he’d handle these requirements. He laughingly pointed to his brown shirt and said “These letters say U-P-S, not A-T-F I’m not in the regulator business, I deliver packages.”
The “notice” required by California Code Section 3273.51 requires the recipient of the part, piece, whatever to sign and date the form, acknowledging the fact they realize it is “generally a crime in California to manufacture more than three firearms per year, manufacture a firearm using a three-dimensional printer or CNC milling machine, manufacture for the purpose of selling or transferring ownership of that firearm to another individual who is not licensed to manufacture firearms, or to manufacture for the purposes of selling, loaning or transferring that firearm without the required background check initiated by a licensed firearms dealer, allowing, abetting, of facilitating the manufacture of a firearm by a person legally prohibited from possessing firearms, or causing the manufacture of assault weapons, machine-guns, undetectable firearms, unserialized firearms, unsafe handguns that are not on the department of justice roster of handguns certified for sale in California or other generally prohibited weapons.”
Apparently the news of the Supreme Court rulings in the Heller and Bruen cases hasn’t made its way into California. But it’s virtually certain 2A organizations there, and nationally, will be waiting at the courthouse steps by, if not before, January 2, 2026 to challenge this latest attempt to help a few more gun-related businesses to head to less restrictive areas.
As always, we’ll keep you posted.
— Jim Shepherd