FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, June 16, 2025
Washington, D.C. — The National Association for Gun Rights is warning Congress: Gun owners are watching, and they expect action. The latest draft of the Senate Finance Committee’s reconciliation bill includes long-overdue rollbacks of the National Firearms Act — repealing the tax on suppressors, short-barreled rifles, and short-barreled shotguns.
After the House passed the reconciliation bill in late May, NAGR and gun owners across the country unleashed a torrent of grassroots pressure demanding the Senate include provisions from the SHORT Act, which removes SBRs, SBSs, and AOWs from the NFA. If passed, it would mark the most significant restoration of Second Amendment rights under federal law in nearly a century.
“The NFA is a relic of the gangster era, a law that treats gun owners like criminals for daring to own common firearms and accessories,” said Dudley Brown, President of the National Association for Gun Rights. “It was designed from the start to strangle the Second Amendment with taxes and red tape, and now, thanks to the relentless work of gun owners, we are finally tearing pieces of it down.”
The SHORT Act guts key NFA regulations, while Section 3 of the HPA (Hearing Protection Act) goes even further, blocking states from enforcing federal suppressor regulations that Congress never gave them the power to enforce in the first place.
“The gun control mob has used the NFA to harass, tax, and punish gun owners for nearly a hundred years, and this is the biggest threat to that agenda we’ve ever seen,” said Brown. “Short-barreled rifles and shotguns are in common use, and suppressors make shooting safer. There’s no excuse to delay. The only people afraid of this bill are those who hate freedom.”
However, the Finance Committee omitted critical preemption language protecting suppressors, an apparent oversight, as the bill does contain similar language for SBRs, SBSs, and AOWs.
NAGR is urging all gun owners to call their Senators and demand that suppressor preemption be added to the final draft and the bill be passed.
Additionally, NAGR is also demanding Senate Republican Leadership defend these pro-gun provisions against hostile efforts by Senate Democrats to gut them from the bill.
“This is a test,” Brown said. “The NFA is a tax, and gun owners will remember who stood strong to repeal it — and who caved. Pass it, or prepare to explain why you didn’t in the next election.”
For more information, please contact Taylor Rhodes at media@gunrights.org.
The National Association for Gun Rights is a 501(c)(4) organization headquartered in Loveland, Colorado, dedicated to defending the Second Amendment and fighting for the rights of peaceable Americans to keep and bear arms. Since its founding in 2001, NAGR has worked to hold anti-gun politicians accountable and promote maximum individual liberty by mobilizing more than 4.5 million members and grassroots activists nationwide.
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