BELLEVUE, WA – Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership (JPFO) has filed a federal lawsuit seeking declaratory and injunctive relief from continued enforcement of registration and permitting requirements for noise suppressors, short-barreled rifles and shotguns, and NFA-defined “any other weapons.”
The lawsuit notes last year’s “One Big, Beautiful Bill Act removed the transfer taxes from those items, while leaving the registration requirements intact. Without the tax, these requirements are no longer valid, and should thus be struck down.
Joining JPFO in this legal action are the Buckeye Firearms Association, the American Suppressor Association Foundation, Meridian Ordnance, and two private citizens, T.J. Roberts and Zachary Cockrell. They are represented by attorneys David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson and Nicholas A. Varone at Cooper & Kirk in Washington, D.C. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, Covington Division.
Joining JPFO in this legal action are the Buckeye Firearms Association, the American Suppressor Association Foundation, Meridian Ordnance, and two private citizens, T.J. Roberts and Zachary Cockrell. They are represented by attorneys David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson and Nicholas A. Varone at Cooper & Kirk in Washington, D.C. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Kentucky, Covington Division.
“When registration was required on suppressors and firearms,” JPFO noted, “it was justified only because of the $200 tax provision in the National Firearms Act. Now that the taxes have been eliminated, there really cannot be any further registration requirement. The language in our lawsuit makes that clear: ‘While the NFA’s regulations may have been permissible in support of the statute’s taxes on making and transferring firearms, that justification no longer remains for items whose making and transfer are no longer taxed. To the extent that the NFA imposes requirements on making, transferring, receiving, possessing, or otherwise using untaxed firearms, it cannot be justified as an exercise of any other Article I power. Accordingly, the NFA is unconstitutional as to the untaxed firearms.’”
