I was looking through this month’s American Rifleman, reading some of the Legislation sections when I noticed something about ammo and components in an article about riders the NRA has championed. The article seems to indicate that this rider (which was passed) made it illegal for the government to destroy serviceable ammunition and components.
Would this reopen the US Surplus Ammo market, or was the rider only targeting components? I don’t have many details at this point other than the limited information I recall about the article.
From what I have been told, you can register to be able to bid at government surplus auctions where they auction off components such as brass and other items instead of destroying them. Maybe somebody else with more knowledge on this subject can elaborate.
In the past, the surplus brass from military ranges was sold at auction. Companies would buy the brass and simply resell the unprocessed brass, or process it and resell or make reloads out of it and resell it.
If you haven’t noticed, the metals market has sky-rocketed in the last several years. Many people have taken note, including criminals. Thieves steal wire, pipe, fittings, etc. from new construction. This prompted many states to make any metals thefts an automatic felony.
The DoD also took note. They could stand to make more money off of the brass if sold for scrap. China is probably the largest consumer of these types of metals. A decision was made to put the surplus brass in a different “category” that required mutilation of the brass. That made it unusable and no longer desirable to the usual customers. The brass could then be sold for more money as scrap.
A lot of small companies in the US depend on the surplus brass. Everyone from Joe Reloader to some big reloading names were extremely upset.
As you noted, people spoke out and a law was made to prevent the cut off of milsurp brass. So the milsurp brass flows freely again.