Court rules that once Congress eliminated the NFA’s tax, the federal government lost its Constitutional basis for enforcing the registration scheme
A federal judge in Texas has delivered a major blow to the federal government’s decades-old restrictions on suppressors, short-barreled rifles, and short-barreled shotguns.
U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix ruled that key National Firearms Act (NFA) regulations can no longer be enforced against the plaintiffs because Congress eliminated the tax that had served as the Constitutional foundation for those regulations.
The decision in Jensen v. ATF strikes at one of the central mechanisms of the 1934 National Firearms Act: forcing Americans to register certain firearms and firearm accessories with the federal government before they can lawfully possess them.
For decades, the NFA imposed a $200 tax on transfers and certain manufacturing of regulated firearms, while also requiring registration with the federal government.
But Congress changed the equation when it reduced the applicable NFA tax to zero dollars in 2025.
Judge Hendrix concluded that this change was Constitutionally significant because the government could no longer rely on Congress’s taxing power to justify regulations that had historically been tied to the tax.
Hendrix wrote:
“By zeroing out the transfer and making taxes for most NFA firearms, Congress eliminated the constitutional basis for the regulations that formerly supported the taxes for those firearms.”
The ruling means that, if it survives appeal, law-abiding Americans could no longer be subjected to the NFA’s federal registration requirements for suppressors, short-barreled rifles, and short-barreled shotguns covered by the decision.
That would represent a dramatic change from the current system, under which these items have been subjected to additional federal registration requirements simply because of how they are classified under the NFA.
The National Association for Gun Rights posted on X:
“We have the silver bullet to end large parts of the NFA. All we need is the DOJ to not jump in front of it.”
The decision is particularly significant for suppressors, which have become increasingly common among American gun owners seeking to reduce noise and protect their hearing while shooting.
According to federal data, more than 6.4 million suppressors were registered in the United States as of June 2026.
But gun owners should not mistake the ruling for the immediate repeal of the entire National Firearms Act.
Judge Hendrix temporarily stayed the decision to give the federal government an opportunity to seek relief from the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, meaning the government is expected to challenge the ruling.
The case could therefore become an important test of whether Congress can continue imposing sweeping regulatory requirements under the NFA after eliminating the tax that historically provided the stated constitutional justification for those requirements.
The implications could extend well beyond suppressors and short-barreled firearms if the courts ultimately agree that Congress cannot retain regulatory restrictions after removing the Constitutional authority on which those restrictions were based.
For nearly a century, the federal government has treated the NFA as justification for imposing extraordinary restrictions on otherwise law-abiding Americans who choose to own certain firearms and accessories.
Now, a federal court has called that framework into question.
The National Association for Gun Rights has long argued that Americans should not have to seek permission from the federal government simply to exercise their Second Amendment rights.
If Judge Hendrix’s ruling survives the inevitable appeals, this case could mark one of the most significant challenges to the NFA in its history.
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