Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-GA) and more than 40 members of the House and Senate sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi Thursday, asking her to adopt Congress’s position and intent “regarding ongoing litigation challenging the National Firearms Act’s (NFA) registration and transfer requirements for non-taxed NFA firearms.”
The letter was CC’d to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) acting director Daniel P. Driscoll.
The letter says:
As Members of Congress who supported the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and participated in the legislative process surrounding Section 70436 of that Act, we wish to reaffirm that it was our intent, in enacting Section 70436, to repeal the transfer and registration requirements under the NFA by eliminating the associated excise taxes for certain firearms.
It continues, “It remains our clear intent that these transfer and registration requirements shall no longer apply to firearms now subject to a $0 tax, for the reasons outlined above.”
Rep. Clyde and others–many of the signatories of the letter among them–have contended that there are no grounds for NFA’s registration requirements once the tax is eliminated. As of January 1, 2026, the tax will fall from the current level, $200, to zero. The signatories of the letter are urging Bondi to bring the DOJ in line with the congressional position that registration should be done away with as well.
From the letter:
The registration requirements under the NFA are, in fact, inseparably linked to its taxation provisions. Registration serves as the mechanism by which the ATF accounts for the tax paid on each firearm, identified by its serial number. The tax stamp affixed by the ATF to an NFA transfer and registration application reflects both the firearm’s serial number and the amount of tax paid for the transfer. Moreover, the NFA’s criminal provisions pertain exclusively to the failure to pay or register the payment of this tax with the ATF. Any reinterpretation of the NFA that allows registration to persist once taxation has been removed contradicts the statute’s text, its structure, and Supreme Court precedent.
Clyde told Breitbart News, “We have a historic opportunity to ensure both NFA taxation and registration on suppressors and short-barreled firearms are gone for good. The DOJ is fully empowered to decline to defend statutory provisions that no longer rest on a valid constitutional basis. It has exercised that authority before, and it must do so again – this time in defense of Americans’ Second Amendment rights. Our liberties are not up for debate or interpretation, which is why I will not rest until we win this fight.”
In addition to Clyde, the signatories to the letter are Sens. Steve Daines (R-MT), Bill Cassidy (R-LA), Tim Sheehy (R-MT), Michael S. Lee (R-UT), and John Cornyn (R-TX), as well as Reps. Lauren Boebert (R-CO), Wesley Hunt (R-TX), Scott Perry (R-PA), John Rose (R-TN), Barry Moore (R-AL), Rick W. Allen (R-GA), Scott DesJarlais (R-TN), Earl L. “Buddy” Carter (R-GA), Cory Mills (R-FL), David J. Taylor (R-OH), Adrian Smith (R-NE), Chip Roy (R-TX), Sheri Biggs (R-SC), Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), Mary Miller (R-IL), H. Horgan Griffith (R-VA), Derek Shmidt (R-KS), Andy Biggs (R-AZ), Ryan Zinke (R-MT), Ralph Norman (R-SC), Richard Hudson (R-NC), Diana Harshbarger (R-TN), Michael Cloud (R-TX), Riley M. Moore (R-WV), Nicholas J. Begich III (R-AK), Mark Harris (R-NC), Tim Burchett (R-TN), Clay Higgins (R-LA), Randy K. Weber (R-TX), Guy Reschenthaler (R-PA), Brian Jack (R-GA), Marlin Stutzman (R-IN), Mike Bost (R-IL), Eric Burlison (R-MO), Ben Cline (R-VA), and Jeff Hurd (R-CO).
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio and holds a PhD in Military History with a focus on the Vietnam War (brown water navy), U.S. Navy since Inception, the Civil War, and Early Modern Europe. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com.
