Director Cekada and Chief Counsel Leider laid out what the process will look like for legally buying, selling, and making things like silencers, short-barrel shotguns and rifles (SBR), and Any Other Weapons (AOWs) in the wake of Silencer Shop v. ATF. They said the ATF will treat all law-abiding Americans the same under the new guidance and won't enforce the enjoined sections of the NFA against anyone regardless of whether they are technically covered by the injunction. They said for most people, depending on the state they live in, buying a silencer or SBR would now be effectively identical to buying a gun that isn't regulated by the NFA: just pass a background check and pay.

The pair also discussed what ATF expects from licensed gun dealers who sell the impacted NFA items. They said the ATF will also treat all dealers the same regardless of whether they are technically covered by the injunction. But they also said dealers will still need a Special Occupational Tax (SOT) designation to sell the items, even though they no longer need to fill out all of the traditional sales paperwork.

Cekada and Leider cautioned that neither the injunction nor the ATF's guidance impacts state law, more than a dozen of which require ATF approval for residents to possess NFA items. They said the ATF doesn't have an alternative process for granting permission to possess NFA items, but will allow people to voluntarily continue registering NFA items in order to comply with state law.

Cekada also published an open letter, and ATF released a frequently asked questions document that detail how ATF plans to handle the situation. Leider encouraged people to read those documents before reaching out to ATF for more information, but the pair also said they would be fielding more questions down the line.

Special Guests: Robert Cekada and Robert Leider.

To do that, we have one of the plaintiffs in the case. Travis White is the President of the Firearms Regulatory Accountability Coalition (FRAC), which filed suit against the NFA the same day the federal government officially slashed a number of NFA taxes to $0. He said that's what made the NFA vulnerable to a challenge, at least the provisions that regulate silencers, short-barrel rifles and shotguns, and what the law calls "any other weapons."

US District Judge James Wesley Hendrix agreed. He ruled that the NFA sections whose taxes were eliminated also lost their constitutional justification. White said the judge was persuaded by the plaintiffs' argument that the NFA is, at its heart, an exercise of Congress's taxing power and its provisions can only stand if they are in furtherance of collecting revenue.

White said Hendrix agreed with FRAC that a $0 tax can't justify imposing registration, fingerprinting, and various other requirements to prove it has been paid. White argued that if a tax doesn't even try to raise funds, then it can't be considered a tax. Hendrix was persuaded.

But that didn't end the inquiry. White said the judge also determined the remaining NFA taxes on machineguns or gun makers don't mean the regulations on the untaxed items can stand. He also brushed aside a justification based on the Necessary and Proper Clause. And he concluded the NFA doesn't fit under the federal government's power to regulate interstate commerce either.

Special Guest: Travis White.