Several leading gun rights organizations are now reportedly taking aim at one of the oldest pillars of federal gun control, filing what they call the “Big Beautiful Lawsuit” to challenge the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms over restrictions on silencers and short-barreled firearms.
The lawsuit, filed by the Silencer Shop Foundation, Gun Owners of America, Palmetto State Armory, and other groups, argues that the 1934 National Firearms Act (NFA) can no longer be justified after Congress eliminated its underlying tax.
The Big Beautiful Bill, passed earlier this year, will repeal the $200 tax on silencers, short-barreled rifles, and other regulated firearms beginning in 2026.
For nearly a century, the NFA has required Americans to register and pay a special tax for purchasing certain firearms or accessories deemed especially dangerous.
But gun rights advocates say the law’s premise was built entirely on tax enforcement, and with that tax set to expire, the federal registry is on shaky legal ground.
“This lawsuit isn’t about picking a fight — it’s about ending one that started in 1934,” said Dave Matheny, CEO and founder of Silencer Shop. “For nearly a century, Americans have been told they need to beg for permission to protect their own hearing. That’s not safety. That’s government inertia. We’re fighting to restore the kind of common sense our grandparents took for granted — where you could enjoy your rights without a calendar and a checkbook standing in the way.”
The NFA’s registry, originally designed to track tax compliance, became one of the government’s most powerful tools for regulating firearms deemed “unusual.”
Critics argue that it morphed into a de facto list of lawful gun owners and has done little to deter crime. With Congress striking down the tax, the plaintiffs contend that the law’s constitutional foundation has effectively vanished.
According to the complaint, the elimination of the tax “removes the constitutional justification” for classifying silencers, short-barreled rifles and shotguns, and the catch-all category of “any other weapon” under the 1934 act.
Erich Pratt, senior vice president of Gun Owners of America, described the case as a pivotal opportunity to roll back decades of overreach. “This is a once-in-a-generation opportunity to dismantle one of the most abusive federal gun control laws on the books,” Pratt said. “With the tax struck down by Congress, the rest of the NFA is standing on air. We’re ready to take this fight to the courts and finally end the federal registry once and for all.”
The Silencer Shop Foundation, the legal advocacy branch of the Texas-based retailer, argues that success in court would not only lift an unnecessary financial burden on gun owners but also protect them from future attempts to reimpose fees or expand regulation.
Gun control advocates have long defended the NFA as a critical safeguard against violent crime, but the lawsuit’s backers see its repeal as a necessary correction.
For them, the issue is not about deregulation, but about restoring a constitutional balance — one they argue was distorted by nearly a century of bureaucratic entrenchment.
If the plaintiffs prevail, the decision could mark one of the most significant shifts in federal firearms law in generations — and a resounding victory for those who see the Second Amendment not as a privilege, but as an unqualified right.
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