The Department of Justice (DOJ) has announced plans to create the first-ever dedicated Second Amendment section within the agency’s Civil Rights Division. But thus far, the agency hasn’t been too eager to talk about it, and the reported rollout date for the new section to begin operations has already come and gone without any movement.

Officials from the DOJ only publicly confirmed the existence of the planned section for the first time on Friday night after more than a week of media reports.

“The 2nd Amendment is not a second-class right. After the prior administration’s campaign to infringe on Americans’ gun rights, the Justice Department is strongly committed to undoing the damage,” Attorney General Pam Bondi (R.) wrote in a social media post. “This unit within our Civil Rights Division will advance President Trump’s pro-2nd Amendment agenda and protect the right to bear arms for all.”

Details about the move were first reported by Reuters last week, though the plans for the new entity appear to have been months in the making. In a September interview with an alumni publication for her alma mater, Assistant Attorney General and leader of the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division Harmeet Dhillon announced that plans for the new section were already in the works as early as this summer.

According to planning documents provided to Congress and obtained by Reuters, the proposed new section would be tasked primarily with “investigating local laws or policies limiting gun rights,” and it would carry out that work “using existing funds and personnel.” The documents also identified December 4th as the new section’s expected opening date.

However, the DOJ has yet to formally announce the new section beyond Bondi’s social media post, and it remains absent from the Civil Rights Division’s organization page.

The DOJ also has not responded to The Reload’s requests for comment on details about the new division.

Yet while the logistics and start date of the section remain murky, the promise of such a move for gun-rights advocates is self-evident. The symbolic value alone of having an institutionalized arm of the world’s largest law office dedicated to pursuing its interests across the country is an achievement. It stands in contrast to the unprecedented actions taken by the prior administration to elevate gun-control interests into a since-disbanded executive-level office.

Unlike the Biden administration’s Office of Gun Violence Prevention, however, a new Second Amendment section under the Civil Rights Division would have active enforcement authority. That could translate to real upside for gun-rights advocates. The Civil Rights Division has already shown a willingness to flex its muscles against progressive jurisdictions seen as violating the gun rights of their respective residents.

In March, it launched a first-of-its-kind “pattern or practice” investigation into the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for its slow processing of concealed handgun license applications. Merging that case-by-case intervention into a centralized body with a singular mission should create greater opportunities for oversight and enforcement actions across more jurisdictions. That’s certainly where expectations appear to be among the gun policy community, as evidenced by the fanfare and controversy mere reports of the new division have generated to date.

Of course, there are also serious caveats to consider.

The DOJ’s lack of transparency to this point about the new section means we just don’t know how ambitious the new plans are or what they will look like in practice. There’s little reason to doubt the veracity of the reports from Reuters, particularly considering Assistant Attorney General Dhillon’s past public comments. But the fact that the reorganization will likely occur without any additional funding or personnel raises the possibility that the move will amount to little more than slapping a new name on the same work we’ve already seen.

And finally, there’s reason to question the staying power of the new section and its work. What can be created through a unilateral reorganization can also be disbanded through the same means under a subsequent administration. Just look at the unceremonious dismantling of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention from earlier this year.

Ultimately, the mere existence of a dedicated federal civil rights office focused on the Second Amendment is an important achievement for the gun-rights movement. But without more formal indications from the DOJ regarding its launch, staffing, and strategy, it is difficult to say whether it will amount to more substance than flash.