The trial for Hunter Biden’s three alleged gun crimes begins Tuesday and the penalties for some of the allegations include jail time and steep fines.
The form on which Biden is alleged to have given false answers is an ATF Form 4473, a firearms transaction form used while undergoing a National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) check when buying a gun at retail.
This is how the process works: The prospective buyer fills out an ATF Form 4473 and hands it to a Federal Firearms License (FFL) holder, who then calls the FBI and relays the information from the form, receiving either the all-clear to sell the gun or a rejection, which means the gun cannot be sold to the would-be buyer. A third option is that the FBI can alert the FFL holder that it will extend the background check another three business days to give FBI reviewers additional time to check criminal records.
The ATF Form 4473 is crucial to the integrity of the NICS check, as one of the questions on it says:
Are you an unlawful user of, or addicted to, marijuana or any depressant, stimulant, narcotic drug, or any other controlled substance? Warning: The use or possession of marijuana remains unlawful under Federal law regardless of whether it has been legalized or decriminalized for medicinal or recreational purposes in the state where you reside.
The form allows one of two possible answers to this question, and those answers are “yes” or “no.”
ABC News reported that Biden “allegedly lied on a federal form that he was not addicted to drugs.”
The penalty for lying on an ATF Form 4473 includes fines up to $250,000 and/or ten years of imprisonment.
