DOJ Just Declared WAR On The NFA Challenge!

Added: 2026-05-31

[00:00:00]Well, we now know how the Department of Justice is going to defend the National Firearms Act in court. Pay attention.

[00:00:07]Welcome back, guys and gals. This is Guns and Gadgets, your premier source for Second Amendment news. Got a major update today and what may become one of the most important gun rights court battles of the decade and of the last 91 years to be honest. And if you've been following this channel, then you already know that after President Trump signed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act into law, the $200 making and transfer taxes on suppressors, short barrel rifles, short barrel shotguns, and any other weapons were reduced to $0. And that immediately sparked a series of lawsuits arguing that if the tax is gone, then the constitutional foundation for the National Firearms Act is gone as well.

[00:00:48]And now the federal government has officially responded in one of those lawsuits. The Department of Justice has filed a 56page memorandum in federal court in Kentucky. And if you're a gun owner, you need to understand exactly what they're arguing because this document reveals the road map the government intends to use to keep the NFA alive. Today, I'll break it all down for you. But before I do, if you're new here, please subscribe to the channel and turn on the notifications. I cover the Second Amendment. I cover all the Second Amendment news every single day because the fight for liberty never takes a day off. And generally, I don't either. So, please check the channel directly. If you're not seeing one to four videos a day, then YouTube is stopping you from seeing my content.

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[00:01:42]And I also want you to watch this clip intently.

[00:01:59]My name is Eric Salsbury. I was involved in a self-defense shooting in Portland, Oregon. I had been a member of AR for about 6 months before this happened. I was amazed at the response of the AO legal team. From the moment that I called and talked to Andrew, they were on the case and they were talking to the detectives, to the police officers. If you own a firearm, you've got to be able to protect yourself on the legal side.

[00:02:27]This team will do that for you.

[00:02:35]>> When people think about self-defense, they focus on the moment it happens. but not what comes after. If you're involved in a self-defense incident, you could face a criminal trial to defend your rights. And even if you're 100% justified, you could still end up in a civil lawsuit afterward. That's why I recommend attorneys on retainer. Members get unlimited civil and criminal representation, so you're covered no matter how complex things get. They also cover private investigators and expert witnesses. Plus, think about a situation where someone legally defends others or themselves during a dangerous incident, but because of where it happened, like a restricted area or some policy decision about their firearm, they could still face separate charges.

[00:03:21]Even if self-defense itself was justified and attorneys on retainer got you covered. I mean, that's a gap that most people don't realize exists and AO plugs that gap perfectly.

[00:03:34]Guys, serious. If you carry a gun, you need to join. AO is not insurance. It's you literally hiring your attorneys that will defend you after you defend yourself or others. Join now using my link or the QR code here on the screen and save $50 on your individual signup fee or $25 off your family plan signup fee through July 31st of 2026 in celebration of USA 250. Now, time's running out there to save that money.

[00:04:03]Uh, so I mean if you carry a gun, you need to have someone who will have your back. So join AOR. All right, let's get into this. This case that the uh DOJ responded in is Roberts versus ATF and it challenges the continued enforcement of portions of the National Firearms Act after Congress eliminated the transfer and making taxes on suppressors, shortbarreled firearms, and AOS.

[00:04:27]The plaintiffs are essentially making a very simple argument. The NFA was upheld historically as a tax. The Supreme Court repeatedly described it as a tax.

[00:04:37]Congress itself justified it as a tax.

[00:04:40]So if the tax is gone, then the registration requirements, the approval requirements, the transfer restrictions, and the criminal penalties attached to those firearms should also fall. That argument has gained enormous traction among gun owners because many people have waited long, long time to to get where we are. And people have long viewed the NFA as a regulatory scheme disguised as a tax. And remember that this isn't some fringe argument here.

[00:05:07]The government itself acknowledges in this filing that Congress reduced those taxes to $0 through the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. But here's where things get interesting. The DOJ response boils down to three major arguments. The first argument is procedural. The government says some of the plaintiffs don't even have standing to challenge portions of the law. In other words, the DOJ is attempting to narrow the scope of the lawsuit before the court even reaches the constitutional questions.

[00:05:35]And this is standard government litigation strategy. They try to do this all the time. I mean, if you can't win on the merits, then sometimes you try to reduce the battlefield. The second argument is where things get really important. The DOJ claims that the NFA is still supported by Congress's taxing power even after making the after the making and transfer taxes were reduced to $0.

[00:05:59]Now, how do they get there? Well, they argue that while the taxes on suppressors, SBS, SPS's, and AWS were reduced to $0, other NFA taxes remain in place. specifically the special occupational tax, the SOT tax paid by manufacturers, dealers, and importers of NFA items. And the government says because that tax still exists, the registration requirements and approval process still serves a revenue collection purpose. In other words, their position is that the NFA's regulatory structure helps enforce the taxes still being paid by businesses involved in the NFA marketplace. Now, I know what many of you are thinking. That sounds like a stretch. And that's exactly what the plaintiffs are arguing.

[00:06:45]The plaintiffs contend that Congress eliminated those taxes that ordinary citizens actually pay when making or transferring these firearms. They say the constitutional justification vanished. The government says, "Oh, not so fast. We still have taxes elsewhere in the system. Therefore, the framework survives." And this is going to become one of the central legal questions in this case. But the DOJ didn't stop there. And frankly, this next part is probably the most important section of the entire filing. So listen up. The government is now openly arguing that even if the taxing power argument fails, the National Firearms Act can survive under the Commerce Clause. Let that sink in. For decades, the NFA was generally defended as a tax measure. Now, the government is making a strong alternative argument that Congress can regulate these items because they move through interstate commerce. The DOJ says the NFA regulates manufacturers, dealers, distributors, purchasers, and firearms that move through interstate markets. according to the government, that places the law squarely within Congress's authority to regulate interstate commerce. And that matters enormously because if courts accept this argument, this bogus BS argument, then even a complete elimination of every NFA tax may not automatically destroy the NFA. The government is essentially building a constitutional backup plan.

[00:08:19]They're telling the court, even if you don't agree with our taxing power argument, Congress still has commerce clause authority. And if that wasn't enough, they're also uh invoking the necessary and proper clause as another source of authority. Now, from a Second Amendment perspective, this should concern every single freedom loving American because if the government wins this argument, it dramatically expands the potential constitutional basis for federal firearm regulation. The battle is no longer just about taxes when it comes to the NFA. It's about the scope of federal power itself. And that's where we get to the Second Amendment section of the filing. Finally, the DOJ argues that suppressors and shortbarreled rifles remain constitutionally regulable even after Breuan. The government leans heavily on the old Supreme Court case United States versus Miller from 1939.

[00:09:16]According to the filing, Miller established that shortbarreled shotguns were not protected in the same manner as ordinary arms. And the government argues that the same reasoning extends to those short-barreled rifles.

[00:09:30]The DOJ also points to more recent lower court decisions that it claims support continued regulation of suppressors and shortbarreled rifles.

[00:09:41]Look, I know they're going undergone some big changes and you know they still say and claim they're the most pro2A Department of Justice in the history of the United States and that's a very low bar and I've showed you all the good things that Har Dylan has done for the Second Amendment versus states. I I have to believe people who know Todd Blanch personally when they tell me the dude is one of us.

[00:10:07]But can't they be for the Second Amendment when it comes to fighting the federal gun control? I mean, is that just not does that not make sense to anybody else but me? If you want to target the states when they're violating the Second Amendment, can't you turn that gun around and target the feds, too, because you guys and gals are doing it?

[00:10:29]Additionally, the government argues that these items fit within a historical tradition of regulating weapons it characterizes as particularly dangerous or susceptible to criminal misuse.

[00:10:39]However, that's not what any of the court decisions in the Supreme Court says. It's dangerous and unusual if you remember. Now, whether that argument survives brewin analysis is another matter entirely because many many gun owners would argue that suppressors are nothing more than hearing protection devices. It's a muffler.

[00:10:58]They're legal in most states. They're owned by millions of Americans. In fact, yesterday a stat came out of um the ATF that there are now over 6 million suppressors in circulation registered to Americans through the NFA. 6 million.

[00:11:15]And that, my friends, is common use.

[00:11:19]Cans are almost never used in violent crime. Likewise, many would argue that an SB is functionally identical to countless firearms already protected by the Second Amendment. The difference is often a few inches of barrel length.

[00:11:32]This much shorter on your barrel makes you a felon for no reason other than a number, just math. And that's why these cases are so important. They're forcing courts to answer questions that have largely gone unanswered in the post Brewan era. But there is another aspect of this filing that I think gun owners really need to pay attention to. The government repeatedly emphasizes that Congress intentionally left the NFA's registration requirements, approval requirements, and criminal penalties intact when it passed the One Big Beautiful Bill Act. And that flies directly in the face of the videos I've done where the people who actually wrote that language in that bill said, "Absolutely not. We wanted it all gone.

[00:12:17]I wonder if that'll come up in this filing.

[00:12:20]And it's not accidental language. The DOJ is essentially telling the court, look, Congress knew exactly what it was doing. Congress removed some taxes, but deliberately preserve the rest of the NFA. Therefore, the courts should respect that legislative decision.

[00:12:34]Again, that's a significant argument because it attempts to frame the current NFA structure as something Congress affirmatively chose rather than something left behind accidentally or something that an unelected bureaucrat who's not a member of Congress or the Senate, particularly the parliamentarian, some Democrat woman appointed by Harry Reid, she stripped from the one big beautiful bill act because of the bird rule.

[00:13:01]The bird rule also not in the constitution. So, where does this leave us? In my opinion, this filing confirms what many of us expected as these uh cases move through the system. The federal government is not going to surrender the NFA without a fight. Not even close. The DOJ is throwing every constitutional argument it can that it can find, that it can locate, they can look under a rug and see. They're putting it all on the table. Taxing power, commerce clause, necessary and proper clause, historical traditions, standing arguments, everything, everything they can possibly try. And honestly, if you are a supporter of the Second Amendment, you should want these questions answered once and for all.

[00:13:37]Because for nearly a century, Americans have lived under a law that was originally justified as a tax. Now that portions of that tax have been reduced to zero, courts are being asked whether the underlying regulatory regime can continue standing on its own. That's not a trivial question. That's legit. It's a constitutional question. And it's exactly the type of issue that eventually could find its way to the Supreme Court. So, this case is far from over. We know this. We know this is going to be a knockdown dragout fight.

[00:14:04]You know, the the dogs are going to be chewing on this one for a while. In fact, I believe we're still in the very early innings of this. The plaintiffs have made their case. The government now has made its case and now the courts will begin sorting through these competing constitutional arguments. For gun owners, for us, the stakes couldn't be higher because the outcome won't just affect suppressors. It won't just affect shortbarreled rifles. It won't just affect shortbarreled shotguns or any other weapons. It could determine how far Congress can go in regulating firearms under theories of taxation of interstate commerce and federal authority for years to come. And none of that is in the Constitution. None of that is in the Second Amendment. So, this whole scheme is unconstitutional.

[00:14:48]But you know that, we all know this. As always, I'll continue tracking every development and bringing you the updates as they happen. If you appreciate that coverage, please subscribe to Guns and Gadgets, hit the notification bell, and share this video with someone who cares about freedom. That'll take you about 15 seconds of your life, and it drastically helps this channel, and I am eternally grateful for that. The founders understood that liberty survives only when citizens remain vigilant. And in modern moments like this, constitutional vigilance matters more than ever. Until next time, stay safe, stay armed, and stay free. I'll see you on the next one.

[00:15:23]Take care.