Federal Court Strikes Down NFA Registration Requirements for Suppressors, Short-Barreled Rifles, and Short-Barreled Shotguns

In another major victory for the National Rifle Association and law-abiding gun owners, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas today held that the National Firearms Act’s registration and approval requirements for suppressors, short-barreled rifles, and short-barreled shotguns exceed Congress’s constitutional authority after Congress eliminated the NFA’s transfer and making taxes on those arms.

The court concluded that Congress enacted the NFA as an exercise of its taxing power and that the statute’s extensive regulatory requirements—including registration, applications, ATF approval, fingerprinting, and related criminal penalties—were constitutionally permissible only because they aided the collection of the NFA’s taxes. The court held that once Congress eliminated the transfer and making taxes for suppressors, SBRs, and SBSs last year, the constitutional foundation for those regulatory provisions disappeared.

The court rejected the government’s argument that the remaining regulations could instead be justified under the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper Clause, explaining that Congress enacted the challenged provisions solely pursuant to its taxing authority. The court therefore held the challenged provisions unconstitutional on Article I enumerated-powers grounds and declined to reach the plaintiffs’ Second Amendment claims.

The Court stayed the effect of the Final Judgment for seven days to allow the government an opportunity to seek relief from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals if it so desires.

The NRA’s case, Jensen v. ATF, was brought alongside the American Suppressor Association, Second Amendment Foundation, and Firearms Policy Coalition, with the plaintiffs Texas State Rifle Association, FPC Action Foundation, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Hot Shots Custom LLC, and individuals John Jensen, Jeremy Neusch, and David Smith. The Jensen case was ultimately consolidated with Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF.

Wednesday Wisdom: 5 August 2026

Staff Sergeant Don Worley, missing from the Vietnam War—Returns Home

 

In 1968, Staff Sergeant Don Worley and 18 other men were assigned to Lima Site 85, a tactical air navigation radar site on a remote, 5,600-foot mountain peak known as Phou Pha Thi in Houaphan Province, Laos. In the early morning of March 11, the North Vietnamese commandos overran the site causing the Americans to seek safety on a narrow ledge of the steep mountain. A few hours later, under the cover of A-1 Skyraider aircraft, U.S. helicopters were able to rescue eight of the men, one of whom was wounded and died of his injuries before he reached the evacuation base. Worley and 10 other Americans were killed in action and their remains could not be recovered at the time of the incident.

 

From 1994 to 2009, joint teams consisting of personnel from Defense POW/MIA Accounting Agency (DPAA) predecessor organizations, Vietnam and Laos, conducted recovery operations at the site and investigations which included interviewing and pursuing leads from dozens of witnesses. Related investigations and site surveys continued taking place from 2016 and onward, including an aerial survey of the area. In 2023, 2025, and 2026, joint teams from DPAA conducted multiple missions at the site, recovering unexploded ordnance, incident-related materials, possible material evidence, and possible bone fragments.

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Night Vision and the PVS-14: How Does It Work?

As technology has advanced, many items formerly relegated to “Buck Rogers” are now not only available, but common. It wasn’t too many years ago that a GPS or handheld laser rangefinder would have been looked upon as something straight out of a science fiction movie. Today, they can be found in most gear bags. As technology steadfastly marches forward, modern electronics continually become smaller, more effective and less expensive. The same is also true of Night Vision Devices (NVDs). Like GPS and laser rangefinders, NVDs were originally designed with the military in mind. Today though, commercial NVDs are widely available. A highly useful tool in its own right, a quality NVD is something more and more outdoorsmen are interested in adding to their gear bag.

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‘Let George Do It’: A Marine’s Medal from Guadalcanal

The George Medal may not be regulation, but for those that received it, it is as real and as earned as any decoration Uncle Sam ever struck in bronze. The horrors of Guadalcanal defied easy explanation. Marines tried anyway. They called it the “green hell,” though even that fell short. So, one miserable night on that crocodile-infested island, a few officers decided the division deserved a medal—not for heroism in the traditional sense, but simply for surviving that dreadful place.

What they came up with was an irreverent decoration absolutely unfit for a general’s podium: a wide-eyed Marine frantically catching a hot potato on one side, and the rear end of a cow primed to unload into a spinning electric fan on the other. Crude? Perhaps. But the so-called “George Medal” was more than a gag. It is emblematic of something deeper.

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Experts Warn You Should Never Share These 5 Things With ChatGPT — And What You Can Do If You Already Did

By any measure, the adoption and use of LLMs (large language models) is astounding, Lee Rainie, director of Elon's Imagining the Digital Future Center, said in a university news release. "I am especially struck by the ways these tools are being woven into people's social lives." While these tools can be useful when it comes to, say, helping you write an email or brainstorm questions for a doctor's appointment, it's wise to be cautious about how much information you share with them.

A recent study from the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered AI helps explain why. Researchers analyzed the privacy policies of six of the top U.S. AI chat system developers (OpenAI's ChatGPT, Google's Gemini, Anthropic's Claude, Amazon's Nova, Meta's MetaAI and Microsoft's Copilot) and found that all of them appear to use customer conversations to "train and improve their models by default" and "some retain this data indefinitely."

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The 300 BLK vs. the 5.56 NATO

   

  

 

So, what to get? 300 BLK vs. 5.56 NATO is a hot debate. AR-15s rule the roost as America’s rifle. The rifle’s proliferation is due in part to decades of use by our armed forces, which have made generations of young men familiar with the platform. On top of that, the AR’s standardization means parts are largely compatible across the board. A user can start with a serialized lower receiver and configure a rifle to serve whatever purpose they may need.

The recent reduction of the $200 tax stamp fee to $0 makes it more compelling for users to buy or convert their existing ARs into short-barreled rifles (SBRs). That puts users at a crossroads: what caliber to pick? In a short-barreled configuration, the two most likely options are 300 Blackout and 5.56 NATO. I’ve shot thousands of rounds of both out of short-barreled ARs, and both have their place, with positives and negatives across the board.

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The 7.62mm M14 Rifle: What You Didn't Know

The U.S. Army's M14 rifle occupies a unique place in American military history. Officially adopted in 1957, it was intended to be the one rifle that could do everything. It would replace the M1 Garand rifle, M1 and M2 carbines, Browning Automatic Rifle, and even the M3A1 submachine gun. Chambered in the new 7.62×51mm NATO cartridge and fed from a detachable 20-round box magazine, the M14 appeared to be the perfect Cold War battle rifle.

I was assigned to the 3rd Infantry Regiment in 1975 and they used the M14 as their primary rifle (still do I believe). I trained and qualified with the M14 and fell in love with the rifle. Hitting man-sized silhouettes at 460 meters with iron sights was no problem at all. In 1976 I spent a over a month’s pay on a Springfield Armory National Match M1A and it remains my favorite rifle.

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Primer Types Explained: Small vs. Large, Standard vs. Magnum

 

The primer is the smallest component in a cartridge and arguably the most critical. It's the ignition source for everything that follows. When the firing pin strikes the primer, it produces a flame that ignites the powder charge, which generates the gas pressure that sends the bullet downrange. If the primer doesn't perform, nothing else matters. Here's what you need to know about primer types and why they matter.

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Auto-Ordnance M1 Carbine Short Barreled Rifle

Every now and then you see something that causes you to go Hummm. The Auto-Ordnance M1 Carbine Short Barreled Rifle or SBR puts a 12-inch threaded barrel and M-Lok accessory slots into a walnut-stocked .30 Carbine platform. Announced on July 16, 2026, it is aimed at shooters who like the light, compact character of the M1 Carbine but want a factory short-barreled configuration.

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The Best .22 Trainer Pistols: 11 Current Models Tested

The “true trainers” are .22 pistols that attempt to mimic the look and feel of a specific centerfire model. The more common category is “pseudo-trainers.” These have the general look and feel of centerfire defense pistols, but they’re not based on any specific model. Most shooters tend to use them less for serious training and more as general plinking and range guns.

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Jeff Cooper's Commentaries: Vol. 4, No. 9; August, 1996

It has long been a principle of mine that a man cannot have too many books, too many wines, or too much ammunition. It turns out that a number of governments in the world manifest considerable distress at the idea of large amounts of ammunition in private hands. They insist that any man who stockpiles thousands of rounds must have some sinister and ulterior purpose which should be investigated by the state. Here we have yet another example of the thought control characteristic of the Age of the Common Man. Many on the left seem to hold that one may be punished not for what he does, but for what he thinks - as with what have come to be called "hate crimes." In this age of thought-control, various sorts of busybodies, in and out of government, feel the need to arrange your thinking for you. 

In this matter of ammunition, I personally like to keep a large supply on hand, not for any specific purpose, but simply because it makes me feel good. To have a large supply - several thousand rounds - of 45 ACP or 30-06 or 308 is comforting in and of itself, and by no means necessarily because one has some conspiratorial notion about expending it. As you know, there are people such as Democratic Senator [fill in the name] who feel that the subtle way to disarm the people is to cut off the supply of ammunition. We hope that such people do not prevail, but it does not hurt to be prepared for unpleasant eventualities - thus we have seat belts, crash helmets, life jackets, and pistols.

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