‘One Big Beautiful Bill’…and Guns
Also: DOGE sets its eyes on gun regs
The “One Big Beautiful Bill Act” signed by President Trump on the Fourth of July is more than a budget bill. It includes all manner of sweeping changes to U.S. law, and firearms policy was not spared. The Act eliminates a longstanding $200 excise tax on short-barreled firearms, suppressors (or silencers), and other items categorized as "any other weapons" under the National Firearms Act (NFA).
Firearms and accessories regulated by the NFA are those determined by Congress to cause a significant crime problem. They include various machine guns, shotguns, rifles, and silencers, among others. They are kept under tight control via tax and registration rules. The elimination of the $200 tax will expand access to these devices.
This represents the most substantial reduction in taxes levied on gun owners since the NFA was enacted in 1934, and marks the first meaningful rollback of NFA-related restrictions since the law’s inception.
The provision does more than reduce a tax. It lays the groundwork for broader legal scrutiny of the NFA itself. By altering core provisions of the Act, it opens the door to new constitutional and statutory challenges, potentially reshaping the legal landscape for federally regulated firearms and accessories in the years to come.
Sources: AP News, The Trace
The Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), the federal unit previously run by billionaire Elon Musk, has been working closely with officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to roll back about 50 federal gun regulations. Anticipated changes include:
Extending the validity of a background check for buying a gun from 30 days to 60.
Shrinking the eligibility questionnaire that most buyers are required to fill out when purchasing a firearm from seven pages to three.
Allowing gun dealers to destroy their records after 20 years, instead of keeping them forever.
These changes dovetail with a flurry of other pro-gun executive actions, which we wrote about here and here, as well as sharp cuts to ATF staffing.
The Department of Justice, which oversees the ATF, has called for a 25% budget cut in fiscal year 2026.
That would mean losing more than 500 investigators—the people responsible for inspecting federally licensed gun dealers. Experts suggest that politicizing the ATF by stripping its career officers and cutting inspectors could undermine trust in federal law enforcement and fuel a cycle of reactive rule-making.
According to the DOJ’s own analysis, the cuts would slash the ATF’s ability to regulate the firearms and explosives industries by roughly 40%.
Keep in mind that the ATF also plays another unique role in law enforcement. It’s the only agency in the U.S. that can trace guns used in crimes. It maintains a database of markings left on bullets or shell casings after a gun is fired—kind of like a firearm’s fingerprint. That tracing data is a key tool police nationwide use to investigate and solve violent crimes.
The Bottom Line
On their own, these individual tweaks might not seem like a big deal, but taken together, they represent a foundational reframing of firearms policy in America.
Gun safety advocates warn that gutting inspection capacity, easing licensing requirements, and greenlighting high‑rate-of-fire conversions, combined with reducing ATF oversight, could have a serious impact on criminal investigations, firearm traceability, and gun deaths and injuries.
The coming months will likely be marked by lawsuits, Congressional pushback, and potential regulatory counter-moves at the state level. Stay tuned.
Sources: NPR, The Washington Post
In the Courts
July 3, 2025: Could ghost guns make a comeback? The legal battle over “ghost guns” is far from over, even after the Supreme Court upheld a Biden-era regulation requiring background checks and serial numbers for certain build-it-yourself firearm kits.
These kits, which allow buyers to assemble functioning guns from parts, have drawn scrutiny from law enforcement. Because the kits were initially sold without serial numbers or background checks, authorities often couldn't trace the weapons—earning them the moniker “ghost guns.”
“The people who make them, oftentimes, and put them on the street are putting them in the hands of people who are prohibited, putting them in the hands of convicted felons,” said Bill Brooks, who chairs the firearms committee of the International Association of Chiefs of Police. “As evidenced by the fact that so many of them now are showing up at crime scenes.”
But gun rights groups see an opening. The high court’s decision turned primarily on questions of administrative law, and left open the possibility of future challenges, depending on kit designs. —NPR
How do gun-owning voters feel about ghost guns? Check out our survey results.
In the States
June 24, 2025: Texas lawmakers relaxed rules on gun ownership during the most recent legislative session, marking wins for gun owners and gun rights activists after they were signed into law by Gov. Greg Abbott. New legislation bans “red flag” gun confiscation orders and stops local gun buyback programs. These new gun laws will take effect on September 1, 2025. —Fox 7 Austin
How popular are red flag laws, formally known as Extreme Risk Protection Orders (ERPOs), among gun-owning Texans? Check out our interactive map.
My approach is to identify dangers in advance, in conjunction with the so-called “red flag” laws in the United States. These laws can prevent people from using weapons in the short term by taking them away. Police authorities…have responded positively to this. After all these mass shootings, the police are increasingly expected to work preventively before something happens. So not how to better convert a school into a fort or how to react more quickly when it does happen. —97Percent Senior Training Specialist Chris Carita
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