On no planet can it be possibly argued that it was developed for handgun use. How do we know? Because the 5.56x45mm round was designed and manufactured long before any handguns that could fire it even existed. It was developed in the late 1950s and 1960s for use in rifles and was finally standardized by the United States for use in 1963 for the ArmaLite M16. The M855 round, a variant of the 5.56x45mm, is the U.S. version of the Belgian SS109 round, which was developed by the Belgian company Fabrique Nationale, or FN, in the 1970′s. The FN SS109 was also designed and exclusively intended for use in a rifle. The United States first put the M855 to use in the M16A2 platform in the early 1980s. Handgun platforms capable of firing the round were not developed until long after the M855 round was designed, developed, manufactured, and sold. The ATF admitted as much when it wrote that handguns capable of firing the M855/SS109 “were not commercially available when the armor piercing ammunition exemption was granted in 1986.”

You read that correctly: the ATF plainly admits that the round could not possibly have been designed for a handgun, right before the agency wrongfully assumes the authority to mix and match conditions from the two different definitions in the statute.

This sleight of hand actually forms the entire foundation of the ATF’s power grab: since one condition in one part of one definition states that ammunition might be “armor-piercing” if it can be used in a handgun, the ATF claims it has the power to regulate and ban that ammunition. A plain reading of the statute clearly shows that ATF’s interpretation is nonsense.