Dr. John Lott has a new op-ed at Townhall.
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Gun control advocates are trying a new tactic. Instead of trying to ban all handguns, some Democrat states are trying to ban one of the most commonly owned handguns – Glocks, which they claim can be easily converted into machine guns. But these guns
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This week, Maryland’s Democrat Governor Wes Moore and Connecticut’s Democrat Governor Ned Lamont joined California by signing into law a ban on the manufacture, sale, purchase, and transfer of guns with a cruciform trigger bar. A cruciform trigger bar is a vital internal component of semi-automatic pistols—most notably Glock and Glock-style firearms. Named after its cross-like shape, it connects the trigger to the firing mechanism and plays a crucial role in the firearm’s safety and discharge sequence.
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Legislatures in Illinois and New York are among the states actively considering bills to ban these firearms.
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Lawsuits by the NRA and the Second Amendment Foundation were immediately filed against Maryland’s new law. In landmark rulings starting with the District of Columbia v. Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court established that the Second Amendment protects “bearable arms” that are typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes. The Court specifically contrasted these with “dangerous and unusual” weapons, stating that outright bans on common-use firearms (such as handguns) are unconstitutional.
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New Jersey is now in a discovery process to subpoena Federal Firearms Licensees (FFLs) across the state for records involving Glock pistol sales to New Jersey residents.
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Under a 1986 federal law, it is already illegal for ordinary civilians to manufacture or convert a firearm into a machine gun. Twenty-six states have similar laws. There is no evidence that law-abiding gun owners are converting their handguns, and even the advocates for these laws focus on only the threat by criminal gangs. Indeed, all 43 murders in the 20 U.S. attacks involving “Glock switches” that the Crime Prevention Research Center—which I head—has identified since the beginning of 2021 occurred during gang fights.
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Over 65% of police departments in the U.S. issue or authorize Glock handguns for officers. In 2025, Glock had three of the six most popular semi-automatic handguns sold in the United States, with Sig having two of the top six.
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These states argue that Glock knowingly designed and marketed pistols that criminals can easily convert into illegal machine guns using so-called “Glock switches.” They contend that Glock has known about the problem for years, ignored repeated warnings from law enforcement, and still refused to redesign its pistols to make those conversions more difficult.
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Glock rejects the claim that its pistols are uniquely or unusually easy to convert. The company argues that its semiautomatic operating system does not differ fundamentally from those used in many other modern semiautomatic pistols. Glock pistols use a fairly conventional short-recoil, locked-breech design common throughout the handgun industry. Glock also maintains that criminals—not the manufacturer—bear responsibility for illegally modifying firearms with already-prohibited conversion devices.
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Moreover, a Glock switch creates a firing mechanism fundamentally different from that of a true fully automatic machine gun. A military-style machine gun uses an integrated fire-control system specifically engineered for automatic fire. By contrast, a Glock switch disrupts the pistol’s existing trigger-bar and reset mechanism. The device forces the trigger bar out of engagement and causes the pistol’s short-recoil action to cycle uncontrollably. Once the trigger is pulled, the firing continues until the gun exhausts its ammunition.
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That crude method creates serious reliability and safety problems. Because the switch bypasses the pistol’s normal timing and reset functions, the firearm can discharge before the slide and chamber fully close and lock. As a result, the modification creates a real risk of catastrophic malfunction, including damage to the firearm and potentially serious injury to the shooter.
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Common damage includes a destroyed or blown-open magazine, cracked or split receiver or upper, damaged or missing bolt, firing pin, extractor, ejector, operating springs, and stock.
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Flying brass shards or case fragments can slice skin (hands, arms, face, cheek) or embed in tissue. Real incidents include a shooter’s thumb being sliced open “like a box cutter” with powder burns, or brass embedding in a shoulder causing bleeding. Fragments can strike the face or eyes.
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But others besides the shooter can also be harmed. “The problem about that is when you pull the trigger you can’t stop it, the gun, the bullets are going to go and what we’re seeing is young people and adults can’t control their gun. … ” warned Richland County, South Carolina Sheriff Leon Lott. “You may hit a lot of innocent people you may even hit people that’s on your team because you can’t control that gun.”
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These laws don’t target criminals who are already breaking federal and state laws by illegally owning and using guns, let alone using illegal conversion devices; the laws are targeting millions of law-abiding Americans who own one of the country’s most common handguns. If courts allow states to ban Glocks because criminals can illegally modify them, no semiautomatic firearm will be safe from the same argument. The real solution is to prosecute the gangs and criminals using Glock switches—not to outlaw firearms that police and citizens have relied on safely for decades.
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