California still wants to regulate 3D printers because people can use them to make firearms without the state’s blessing. Its vehicle is AB 2047, a bill originally designed to force printer makers to build in technology capable of detecting and blocking gun files.
But after a round of amendments, the bill has been substantially watered down. What started as a mandate is now more of a regulatory tripwire — one that may never actually be triggered.
From Mandate to Maybe
Introduced in February by Assemblymember Rebecca Bauer-Kahan (D-Orinda), AB 2047 originally would have required 3D printers sold or transferred in California to include state-approved “firearm blocking technology” — hardware or software designed to prevent the machine from printing files identified as firearms or firearm components.
The amended version doesn’t actually establish that standard.
Instead, beginning no later than July 1, 2027, the California Department of Justice would check quarterly to see whether ASTM International — the private standards organization involved in additive manufacturing, the industry’s term for 3D printing — has published standards for firearm-blocking technology.
If ASTM does, DOJ gets 24 months to develop guidance or regulations based on those standards. Per the bill, those rules would establish “minimum performance standards” necessary to safely, fairly and effectively implement the technology statewide.
And if ASTM hasn’t published anything by July 1, 2029?
The bill says DOJ “shall not be required to make any further determinations under this section.”
In other words, no ASTM standards, no California regulations under AB 2047.
At least for now.
Passing the Buck
The amended bill flips the original structure on its head.
Instead of California lawmakers deciding what firearm-blocking technology must do, they wait for an outside standards organization to establish the technical foundation. If that happens, DOJ gets to turn it into regulations.
Politically, that’s convenient.
Lawmakers get to vote for “doing something about ghost guns” without having to explain how the technology is actually supposed to work. If the eventual regulations are expensive, ineffective or technologically impossible, DOJ owns the details.
The legislators simply created the machine and walked away.
Legislating by handing the hard decisions to unelected regulators is an interesting move for a political class that spends so much time warning everyone about threats to democracy.
There’s Another Problem: Does This Technology Even Work?
That’s the bigger question hanging over AB 2047.
The blocking software envisioned by proposals like this would somehow have to recognize firearm-related geometry while allowing the countless ordinary objects that contain identical or similar shapes.
A printer doesn’t inherently know whether a particular hole, tube, spring, cavity or other geometry is destined to become part of a firearm, a household object, a prototype or something else entirely.
Even the federal Justice Department has gone looking to the 3D-printing industry for help with the problem.
Then there’s the First Amendment.
The California Senate’s own committee analysis raised questions about restricting what a printer can produce and the unsettled issue of whether computer code constitutes protected speech. California is already fighting on similar ground in its lawsuit involving websites that distribute 3D gun files.
The Electronic Frontier Foundation has also blasted the proposal, arguing that it would effectively build censorship into the printer itself.
That’s what makes AB 2047 more interesting than another California “ghost gun” bill. The state isn’t merely trying to regulate what someone manufactures. It’s attempting to regulate what a general-purpose machine is allowed to process.
The Clock Is Running
AB 2047 cleared the Assembly in May and has since moved through the Senate Judiciary and Public Safety committees.
It now faces the Senate floor — and a deadline.
The Legislature has until August 31 to pass bills this session. If the Senate approves AB 2047 without further amendments, it heads to Gov. Gavin Newsom. If senators change it again, it goes back to the Assembly for concurrence.
That doesn’t leave much time.
Then again, this is California and we’re talking about gun control. Finding time has rarely been the problem.
The Bottom Line
On its face, the amendments look like a win for 3D-printer manufacturers, hobbyists and anyone else who doesn’t particularly like the idea of government-approved software deciding what their machine is allowed to print.
But this isn’t a clean escape.
California hasn’t abandoned firearm-blocking technology. It has outsourced the trigger.
If ASTM never produces the standards, AB 2047 could amount to little more than bureaucratic homework. If ASTM does, however, California DOJ already has the legislative framework it needs to start turning those standards into rules.
The bill deserves to die, teeth filed down or not. A law that outsources its technical trigger to a private standards organization and leaves the actual requirements to regulators is questionable lawmaking before we even get to whether the underlying technology works.
But this is California, in the closing days of the legislative session, with a super majority that rarely lets a gun-control bill expire quietly.
The smart bet isn’t that AB 2047 dies.
It’s that California passes the framework now and waits for someone else to pull the trigger.