Basically, what it says is that short-barrelled rifles, short-barrelled shotguns, suppressors, and the various oddities that get filed under "any other weapon" are no longer subject to the registration and taxation requirements of the NFA. This means those items can now be transferred from a regular 01 FFL dealer on Form 4473, like a regular firearm purchase, assuming they're legal in the state where the transaction is happening.

Note that this only applies to SBRs, SBSes, AOWs, and suppressors. Machine guns and destructive devices (e.g., explosives and launchers thereof) are still subject to Form 4 registration and the long-standing $200 NFA tax.

This is interesting and kind of exciting, but it has a huge caveat built into it that certain enthusiasts may overlook. These items are not being removed from the NFA by this policy change. That would require an act of Congress repealing part or all of the law, and that hasn't happened. All that's happening here is that the ATF is choosing not to enforce the law and notifying everybody of that fact. This is... kind of weird, and means that some future ATF directive could reverse the situation at any moment.

Moreover, if and when that happens, NFA items transferred on Form 4473 during the period when it was allowed may not be grandfathered--and the ATF is going to know about them, because Form 4473. What happens then? Well, it depends on how the future feds decide to do re-enforcement. They could require everyone who has an NFA item bought during the hiatus to register and pay the tax retroactively... or they could just seize and destroy all of said items, since they've technically been contraband the whole time.

So... could be good! Could be REALLY NOT, but the REALLY NOT potential is Future Everyone's problem. The prospect of future complications is... probably not going to stop me from dabbling in the affected items.

Also, and I know I don't usually like to get into politics here, but it's there and it has to be acknowledged: there is the unnerving background fact that this loosening of enforcement is part of the general right-wing erosion of the government, which is... not great in a lot of other ways. I feel a little dirty benefitting from their bullshit... but that's long been part of the inherent paradox of being a Relatively Liberal Gun Guy.

--G.
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Benjamin D. Hutchins, Co-Founder, Editor-in-Chief, & Forum Mod
Eyrie Productions, Unlimited http://www.eyrie-productions.com/
zgryphon at that email service Google has
Ceterum censeo Carthaginem esse delendam.

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CdrMike, Overwatch Reject