Freeman Martin agrees the challenged Texas carry restrictions violate the Second Amendment—but argues the plaintiffs still cannot obtain relief against him.

Texas Department of Public Safety Director Freeman Martin has told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit that three Texas restrictions on carrying firearms are unconstitutional.

But the laws remain on the books.

In an August 14 appellate brief, Martin agrees with the plaintiffs that the challenged restrictions violate the Second Amendment and says they “should not be enforced.”

At the same time, he argues that the lawsuit against him should be dismissed on jurisdictional grounds.

That unusual posture is now at the center of Ziegenfuss v. Martin, Fifth Circuit No. 26-10302, brought by Firearms Policy Coalition and individual plaintiffs Charles Ziegenfuss, David Montgomery, and Brian Robinson.

The case challenges provisions of Texas Penal Code § 46.03 restricting firearms on the premises of racetracks, businesses deriving 51 percent or more of their income from alcohol sold for on-premises consumption, and certain high-school, collegiate, professional sporting, and interscholastic events, subject to statutory exceptions and defenses.

The plaintiffs filed their reply brief on September 11, pressing the Fifth Circuit to reverse the judgment below.

Martin Agrees on the Second Amendment—but Fights the Lawsuit

On the constitutional merits, Martin and the plaintiffs agree on the bottom line.

His brief states that the plaintiffs contend the three challenged laws are facially unconstitutional under the Second Amendment.

“Director Martin agrees.”

He also tells the Fifth Circuit that he has not enforced the challenged laws and “will not enforce them” because he considers them unconstitutional.

But Martin argues that agreement creates jurisdictional problems rather than entitling the plaintiffs to an injunction.

He contends that sovereign immunity bars the suit because the plaintiffs have not shown a sufficient willingness by him to enforce the challenged provisions. He also argues there is no proper Article III controversy between parties who agree on the underlying constitutional issue and that an injunction against him would not necessarily prevent enforcement by local officials or restrictions imposed by private property owners.

Martin therefore asks the Fifth Circuit to vacate the district court’s judgment and remand the case with instructions to dismiss without prejudice.

The plaintiffs reject that argument.

Their reply argues that DPS remains directly connected to enforcement through the arrest authority of Texas Rangers and Highway Patrol officers and indirectly through suspension or revocation of handgun licenses following certain charges or convictions.

They also argue that Martin’s position in court has not been turned into an actual non-enforcement directive to DPS officers and that nothing in the litigation position binds a future director once the case ends.

That distinction matters.

“When the DPS director tells a federal appeals court that these carry bans are unconstitutional, Texans should understand exactly what that does—and does not—mean,” said Texas Gun Rights Foundation President Chris McNutt. “A brief is not an injunction. It does not erase the statutes, and it does not provide the same enforceable protection as a court judgment. That gap is the heart of this fight.”

The Fight Over “Sensitive Places” Continues After Wolford

The procedural dispute does not eliminate the underlying Second Amendment question.

In its March 24 opinion, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas held that the plaintiffs had standing and that the conduct restricted by the challenged provisions falls within the Second Amendment’s plain text.

But the court ultimately upheld the laws.

It concluded that court-appointed amici had identified sufficiently analogous historical regulations to justify Texas’ restrictions as sensitive-place regulations.

The district court appointed Professor Eric Ruben and former Fifth Circuit Judge Gregg Costa to defend the laws’ constitutionality after Martin declined to defend them on the merits. They continue to defend the judgment in their appellate brief.

The plaintiffs argue that the historical evidence does not satisfy the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment framework. They contend that many of the laws offered as analogues are too late, too geographically isolated, or too different from Texas’ modern categorical restrictions.

The appeal also comes after the Supreme Court’s June 25 decision in Wolford v. Lopez.

There, the Court held that Hawaii violated the Second and Fourteenth Amendments by prohibiting licensed concealed-carry permit holders from carrying handguns on private property open to the public unless the property owner gave express authorization.

The Court emphasized that Hawaii had reversed the traditional default rule for property open to the public and imposed a significant new burden on lawful carry.

But Wolford did not decide whether Texas may prohibit firearms at racetracks, 51-percent establishments, or sporting events.

Instead, the decision gives both sides additional Supreme Court guidance for arguing about the historical tradition required to justify modern firearm restrictions.

Private property rights also remain a separate issue. Texas property owners may restrict firearms through applicable state notice and trespass laws. The dispute in Ziegenfuss concerns the government’s own criminal restrictions across designated categories of locations.

The Laws Are Still on the Books

For Texas gun owners, the immediate legal takeaway is simple:

Martin’s concession has not invalidated the challenged statutes.

The current text of § 46.03 still contains the challenged provisions, along with applicable exceptions and defenses.

DPS’s own current carry guidance also continues to identify 51-percent establishments, sporting events, and racetracks among locations restricted under Texas law.

Martin’s appellate position is therefore not a repeal, injunction, declaratory judgment, or amendment to the statute.

Texans should not treat it as authorization to disregard existing law.

The Fifth Circuit is being asked to resolve two very different questions: whether the constitutional challenge can proceed against Martin and, if the court reaches the merits, whether the three restrictions can survive the historical analysis required by the Second Amendment.

That is what makes Ziegenfuss unusual.

The DPS director says the restrictions are unconstitutional. The plaintiffs agree. Court-appointed amici are defending the district court’s decision upholding them. And the statutes themselves remain in force unless and until legally effective relief changes that result.

A government official’s agreement with a constitutional claim matters.

But an enforceable judgment is something different.

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William English’s 2026 National Firearms Survey estimates Americans privately own roughly 208 million handguns, 154 million rifles, and 99 million shotguns. A separate analysis of more than a century of federal firearms-commerce data produces an almost identical handgun-rifle-shotgun distribution.

A new national firearms survey estimates that American adults privately own approximately 461 million firearms.

The 2026 National Firearms Survey, conducted by Georgetown University professor William English, estimates the private stock includes roughly 208 million handguns, 154 million rifles, and 99 million shotguns. It also estimates that about 32.7 percent of U.S. adults—approximately 88 million people—personally own firearms.

The survey was administered online in July and August to a representative sample of 51,398 U.S. adults. It identified 16,688 internally validated gun owners who completed detailed ownership questions. The average validated gun owner reported owning about 5.2 firearms.

Those estimates are not a physical count of every firearm in the country. But a separate analysis by AmmoLand writer Dean Weingarten found that the survey’s breakdown among handguns, rifles, and shotguns closely matches proportions derived from historical federal manufacturing, import, and export records.

That comparison does not independently prove that 461 million firearms currently exist in private hands.

It does provide another useful check on whether the survey’s reported mix of firearm types resembles what more than a century of firearms-commerce records would lead researchers to expect.

Two Different Data Sources Produce Nearly the Same Firearm Mix

Measuring the number of privately owned firearms in the United States is inherently difficult.

The United States does not maintain a comprehensive federal registry identifying every ordinary firearm currently possessed by private citizens. Researchers therefore estimate the private firearm stock through surveys, manufacturing records, import and export figures, and other available data.

English’s survey approaches the question from the ownership side by asking individuals what firearms they currently possess.

The 2026 survey also changed several elements of the 2021 methodology. Ownership questions distinguish personal ownership from household or spousal ownership, questions concerning certain rifles and magazines focus on current rather than past ownership, and respondents are counted as gun owners only after passing a two-stage ownership check.

A separate federal-data comparison approaches the question from the commerce side.

Weingarten used figures compiled from ATF records in a firearm-production dataset maintained by The Trace. That dataset combines historical U.S. manufacturing, import, and export figures going back to 1899.

Using those records without applying a long-term attrition adjustment, Weingarten calculated approximately 512.99 million handguns, rifles, and shotguns entering the domestic stock through 2024: about 231.3 million handguns, 171.0 million rifles, and 110.7 million shotguns.

The striking part is the distribution.

English’s survey works out to approximately 45.1 percent handguns, 33.4 percent rifles, and 21.5 percent shotguns.

The historical commerce figures used in Weingarten’s comparison work out to approximately 45.1 percent handguns, 33.3 percent rifles, and 21.6 percent shotguns.

Those ratios are remarkably close.

But the underlying totals should not be treated as interchangeable.

Commerce records accumulate firearms entering the domestic market over many decades and include firearms that may later have been destroyed, discarded, lost, exported, or otherwise removed from circulation. Survey estimates depend on sampling, weighting, respondent accuracy, and extrapolation from respondents to the national population.

The agreement in firearm-type proportions is therefore better understood as a consistency check, not an independent census confirming an exact 461 million total.

Current federal reporting nevertheless demonstrates the continuing scale of firearm production. ATF’s final 2024 report records 9,474,540 firearms across its manufacturing categories, including approximately 4.03 million pistols, 639,742 revolvers, 2.82 million rifles, 599,775 shotguns, and 1.39 million miscellaneous firearms. The same report lists 399,902 exports.

Survey Estimates 26.4 Million Adults Own AR-15-Type or Similar Rifles

The survey also provides new estimates for firearm categories that regularly appear in Second Amendment litigation.

English reports that 25 percent of gun owners currently own an AR-15-type rifle, while 12.9 percent own another similarly styled semiautomatic rifle.

After accounting for people who own both, the survey estimates that 30 percent of gun owners—approximately 26.4 million American adults—own at least one firearm in those categories.

The report estimates the existing stock at approximately 40 million AR-15-type rifles and another 20 million similarly styled semiautomatic rifles.

It also estimates that 50.5 percent of gun owners, approximately 44.5 million adults, currently own magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds, with approximately 539 million such magazines collectively owned.

Those estimates can be relevant in Second Amendment litigation because the Supreme Court has described constitutional protection as extending to weapons “in common use” for lawful purposes and has connected that principle to the historical tradition concerning “dangerous and unusual” weapons.

Ownership numbers do not resolve every legal question by themselves. Courts continue to dispute how the “common use” principle interacts with other elements of modern Second Amendment doctrine and how that framework applies to particular rifles and magazines.

“When courts confront questions about whether particular arms are commonly possessed, they should begin with an accurate picture of what Americans actually own,” said Texas Gun Rights Foundation President Chris McNutt. “This survey does not decide the constitutional question by itself, but numbers involving tens of millions of owners and tens of millions of firearms are evidence that deserves serious consideration rather than assumptions about how widespread these arms are.”

What the 461 Million Estimate Does—and Does Not—Show

The 461 million figure is an estimate, not a government inventory.

English’s report is survey research posted through SSRN. Its methodology attempts to address several problems inherent in firearm-ownership surveys, including the distinction between household and individual ownership and verification of respondents counted as gun owners.

The federal commerce figures answer a different question.

ATF manufacturing, import, and export records document firearms moving through lawful commerce over time. They do not establish how many remain in private hands today, and datasets constructed from those records require assumptions about long-term attrition when estimating the surviving stock.

That is why the strongest comparison is not that federal data “proves” the survey’s 461 million estimate.

It is that two very different methods produce nearly identical proportions of handguns, rifles, and shotguns.

For researchers, courts, and the public, that provides an additional reference point for evaluating the scale and composition of American firearm ownership.

And for the Texas Gun Rights Foundation, careful documentation of ownership patterns is part of the broader work of legal research and constitutional education.

Chip in today to help the Texas Gun Rights Foundation support Second Amendment litigation, legal research, and constitutional education.

ATF officials say new guidance will address Form 4473 suppressor transfers, short-barreled firearms, interstate travel, and other questions left by the Texas NFA injunction.

The ATF may finally be preparing to answer some of the biggest questions left hanging by the federal court injunction that upended enforcement of key National Firearms Act restrictions.

ATF Director Robert Cekada said new federal guidance dealing with suppressors, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and other affected firearms could arrive within weeks, according to a new report from AmmoLand.

And dealers already conducting covered suppressor transfers received an even more important answer.

Cekada reportedly said Federal Firearms Licensees transferring suppressors using ATF Form 4473 will not be cited for violations merely for conducting those transfers.

That is the clearest statement yet from ATF leadership about a practice that has spread since the Texas NFA injunction took effect in August.

ATF Gives Dealers a Direct Answer

Cekada made the comments during “The Briefing,” an FFL compliance event in Dallas attended by senior ATF officials.

AmmoLand reporter John Crump asked Cekada how ATF Industry Operations Investigators are supposed to handle dealers they encounter transferring suppressors using Form 4473.

According to AmmoLand’s account of the exchange, Cekada said those dealers will not be cited for violations based on those transfers.

Former ATF NFA Division Chief Steve Albro reportedly added that ATF’s policy is to presume suppressors transferred using Form 4473 were lawfully transferred.

That builds on what Texas Gun Rights reported earlier this month.

At least four FFLs reportedly passed ATF inspections after conducting Form 4473-only suppressor transfers, with none receiving violations related to those transactions.

At the time, those inspections offered an important glimpse into ATF’s real-world enforcement posture — but they did not amount to formal agency policy.

Cekada’s reported statement now gives dealers a much more direct answer from the top of the agency.

But written guidance still matters.

An FFL making compliance decisions under federal firearms law should not have to rely on remarks from a conference to determine whether federal inspectors will consider a transaction lawful.

SBRs and SBSs Could Be Next

The forthcoming guidance could also address one of the largest unresolved problems created by the injunction: dealer transfers of short-barreled rifles and short-barreled shotguns.

As Texas Gun Rights explained when the injunction first took effect, the court blocked enforcement of the challenged NFA provisions against covered parties, but separate provisions of the Gun Control Act remained.

One of those provisions, 18 U.S.C. § 922(b)(4), generally prohibits an FFL from transferring an SBR or SBS to an individual unless specifically authorized by the Attorney General consistent with public safety and necessity.

That created a major practical distinction between suppressors and short-barreled firearms even after the injunction took effect.

Now ATF appears to be working on that problem.

AmmoLand reports that forthcoming guidance will address SBR and SBS transfers and could provide a mechanism for transfers outside the traditional Form 4 process.

Exactly how ATF intends to accomplish that remains unclear.

Until the actual guidance is published, speculation about its contents should not be mistaken for existing federal policy.

Interstate Travel Is Also on the Table

ATF is also reportedly preparing guidance on interstate transportation of affected NFA firearms.

That issue matters because the injunction did not simply wipe every related provision of federal firearms law off the books.

Federal law separately addresses interstate transportation of certain firearms, while individual states can impose their own restrictions.

According to AmmoLand, ATF Chief Legal Counsel Robert Lieder acknowledged another important limit during the Dallas event: the agency cannot force states to accept ATF’s interpretation.

That means federal guidance may answer some questions without resolving every legal issue a gun owner could encounter while crossing state lines.

The exact firearm, the owner’s coverage under the injunction, federal law, and the laws of the states involved can all matter.

ATF Says Guidance Is Close

The timing is also significant.

According to AmmoLand, Cekada said the guidance is not finished but is close. He identified ATF, the Department of Justice, and the White House as stakeholders in the process and said he expects the guidance within the next couple of weeks.

ATF officials also discussed separate changes underway for Form 4473, including removal of the county field and other revisions. AmmoLand reports that the revised form is not expected until after the holiday season.

Those Form 4473 revisions should not be confused with the forthcoming guidance implementing the NFA injunction. They are separate developments.

For gun owners covered by the injunction, the immediate issue is what ATF says about the federal restrictions and procedures that remain after the court’s order.

The Guessing Game Needs to End

The legal landscape has moved quickly.

But federal firearms law carries serious consequences, and Americans should be able to determine what the government considers lawful without reconstructing federal policy from conference remarks, anonymous sources, inspection reports, and rumors.

The government has had a binding federal court order in front of it since August.

Now gun owners and dealers need to see the promised guidance in writing.

Texas Gun Rights Foundation will continue tracking the injunction, ATF’s implementation of the ruling, and the legal questions surrounding suppressors, SBRs, SBSs, and other affected firearms.

Chip in today to help the Texas Gun Rights Foundation fund constitutional research, legal education, and public information defending the Second Amendment.

Texas Gun Rights warned that Rare Breed’s patent campaign could become useful to ATF. DOJ then confirmed that private injunctions could advance the agency’s interest in limiting Forced Reset Triggers. Now the Second Amendment Foundation wants the Attorney General to explain why.

First came the warning.

Then came the admission.

Now come the questions.

In August, the Texas Gun Rights Foundation warned that Rare Breed Triggers’ sweeping patent campaign risked turning a hard-won victory over ATF into a government-assisted chokepoint over lawful Forced Reset Trigger technology.

Two weeks later, that concern stopped being theoretical.

As we reported on August 31, the Justice Department told a federal court in Texas that ATF has an interest in “limiting the sale and distribution of FRTs.”

DOJ went further.

In its August 31 Statement of Interest, the government argued that successful patent injunctions obtained by Rare Breed Triggers and ABC IP could support ATF’s public-safety efforts by restricting third-party FRT activity. DOJ told the court that the public-interest factor in the preliminary-injunction analysis should weigh heavily in the plaintiffs’ favor.

Different motives.

Same injunctions.

Now the Second Amendment Foundation has taken the next logical step.

In a September 23 letter to Attorney General Todd Blanche, SAF asked DOJ to explain the factual and legal basis for ATF’s position, including why the agency claims an interest in limiting FRT distribution and why the federal government is inserting itself into private patent litigation in a way that could favor one marketplace participant over others.

Those questions matter because DOJ has already established the basic premise.

ATF sees Rare Breed’s private patent litigation as useful to its own policy objectives.

What SAF wants to know is why that should be ATF’s business in the first place.

SAF Targets What DOJ Still Hasn’t Explained

SAF is careful about what it is—and is not—arguing.

The organization does not take a position on whether the defendants in the Rare Breed multidistrict litigation actually infringe the patents being asserted against them. That remains a patent question for the court.

Instead, SAF focuses on the government’s involvement.

Its letter effectively puts four questions in front of the Attorney General.

First: Why does ATF claim an interest in limiting the sale and distribution of FRTs?

The government’s filing says some devices allow semiautomatic firearms to fire at a “near-automatic rate.” But federal law does not define a machinegun simply by how fast a firearm can be fired. The statutory definition turns on whether a weapon fires automatically more than one shot, without manual reloading, by a single function of the trigger. The government’s own filing recites that definition.

That distinction matters.

In *Garland v. Cargill*, the Supreme Court held that ATF exceeded its statutory authority when it classified bump stocks as machineguns. Cargill involved bump stocks, not FRTs, but the decision reinforced the importance of applying the machinegun definition Congress actually enacted.

The lower courts have not been uniform on FRTs. DOJ’s own filing acknowledges that the Northern District of Texas and Southern District of Texas concluded that the FRTs before them were not machineguns, while an earlier Eastern District of New York decision reached the opposite conclusion.

The federal government ultimately resolved much of that litigation through its 2025 settlement with Rare Breed and other gun-rights plaintiffs. The settlement imposed conditions on Rare Breed, including restrictions involving handgun FRTs and patent enforcement.

But settling litigation is not the same thing as Congress enacting a categorical prohibition on FRTs.

That is why SAF’s question lands.

If ATF believes particular products violate existing federal firearms law, it can identify the statutory basis and defend that position in court.

If the products do not violate federal law, the agency’s asserted interest in reducing their availability deserves a much more precise explanation.

Second: Why is the federal government placing its weight behind one marketplace participant?

This may be the most important new issue raised by SAF.

Rare Breed has private intellectual-property rights. It is entitled to assert valid patents and attempt to prove infringement.

But DOJ is not Rare Breed’s patent counsel.

ATF is not the Patent and Trademark Office.

And federal firearms regulators should not treat the success of one private company’s infringement lawsuits as an independent policy victory unless they can explain why doing so serves a lawful federal interest.

SAF warns that government participation of this kind could tip the marketplace toward one participant while restricting lawful consumer choice and competition.

That concern becomes harder to dismiss when DOJ itself says that successful private injunctions would advance ATF’s interest in limiting FRT distribution.

Third: What actually distinguishes Rare Breed’s products from the competing products ATF wants restricted?

SAF asks DOJ to explain how Rare Breed’s FRT is mechanically and legally different, for ATF’s purposes, from competing products alleged to produce substantially the same result.

That is not a minor technical question.

If the government is going to tell a federal court that restricting certain competitors serves the public interest, it should be able to explain what regulatory distinction separates the favored product from the products it wants restricted.

“Near-automatic rate” does not answer that question.

Neither does the existence of a private patent dispute.

And fourth: What does the settlement’s handgun restriction have to do with the products actually before the court?

The Rare Breed settlement specifically addressed FRTs designed for handguns and defined “handgun” for purposes of the agreement. SAF asks how the defendant products in the current litigation implicate that provision at all.

Again, the point is straightforward.

If DOJ’s asserted public interest is tied to specific safety provisions in the settlement, the government should identify the connection.

If it cannot, then its argument starts looking less like enforcement of defined settlement concerns and more like a generalized federal preference for fewer competing FRTs in the marketplace.

Patent Law Is Not a Substitute Firearms Code

There is an important line here that should not be blurred.

Patent rights are real.

A company that owns a valid patent is entitled to protect the invention covered by its patent claims. A proven infringer can face damages and, when the legal requirements are satisfied, injunctive relief.

Nothing about the Second Amendment nullifies legitimate intellectual-property rights.

But patent law and firearms regulation answer different questions.

The patent question is whether a particular product infringes legally enforceable patent claims.

The firearms-law question is whether a particular product is regulated or prohibited under statutes enacted by Congress.

ATF’s current position risks mixing the two.

DOJ expressly says it is not taking a position on the other preliminary-injunction factors and is not telling the court whether an injunction ultimately should issue. Its argument is narrower: because ATF wants to limit FRT distribution, the government says the public-interest factor weighs heavily toward Rare Breed and ABC IP.

That qualification matters.

But it does not eliminate the concern.

The federal firearms regulator is still asking a court to treat the restrictive effect of private patent litigation as serving a federal policy objective.

That is the issue Texas Gun Rights identified in August.

Our first analysis focused on Rare Breed’s own litigation campaign and warned that a company that defeated ATF’s direct effort to restrict FRTs should be careful not to become a mechanism for producing a similar market result through private lawsuits.

Our second report documented what DOJ then put on the record: ATF sees those private injunctions as potentially useful to its own efforts to limit FRTs.

SAF is now asking the question that naturally follows: What gives ATF a legitimate governmental interest in that outcome?

Patent owners should win or lose patent cases based on patent law.

If Rare Breed proves that a defendant infringes valid and enforceable patent claims, the court can provide whatever remedies the law permits.

But the federal firearms regulator should not get to transform that private dispute into an auxiliary firearms-regulatory system simply because ATF prefers the market consequences of one side winning.

The Question Is Bigger Than Rare Breed

That is why this fight now matters beyond Rare Breed.

The issue is not whether one company is good or bad.

It is not whether every Rare Breed lawsuit is justified or unjustified.

And it is not whether every FRT design presents precisely the same legal question.

The issue is institutional.

What happens when a federal agency cannot secure its preferred restriction through the firearms statutes Congress enacted but discovers that private civil litigation can produce a similar practical result?

Today, that question involves Forced Reset Triggers.

The principle does not have to stop there.

The same logic could arise around another firearm component, another accessory, another manufacturing technology, or another lawful product that federal regulators regard as undesirable.

That is why SAF’s request for clarification is important.

The government’s authority should be identifiable before its power is placed behind a private litigant.

ATF should be able to explain why restricting these products serves a lawful regulatory interest.

It should be able to explain why supporting one market participant’s injunction arguments does not improperly distort private competition.

And it should be able to identify the connection between the specific products before the court and the public-safety concerns DOJ invokes.

Patent owners have rights.

Federal agencies have authority.

Courts have jurisdiction.

Those boundaries matter.

The danger comes when they begin to collapse into one another—when private patent enforcement becomes useful as a substitute mechanism for a firearms restriction the government could not otherwise establish.

Texas Gun Rights warned about that danger before DOJ’s August filing.

DOJ then confirmed that ATF views private injunctions as advancing its interests.

Now SAF has put the next question directly before the Attorney General:

What is the legal and factual basis for putting the federal government’s weight behind that result?

That answer matters far beyond one company and one patent fight.

If you want the Texas Gun Rights Foundation to keep investigating government actions that affect the Second Amendment and educating Texans about what they mean, chip in today to support our legal research and public-education work.

The federal government is reportedly standing down from an appeal of a Texas ruling that blocked major National Firearms Act requirements for suppressors and other untaxed firearms. The decision does not remove suppressors from the NFA nationwide—but it could reshape the legal fight over whether they belong there at all.

A major federal court victory against the National Firearms Act appears poised to stand without an appeal from the Justice Department.

President Donald Trump has directed the Department of Justice not to appeal the August ruling in Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF, according to CBS News. A DOJ official told the outlet that the Department intends to notify Congress that it will not challenge the decision.

If the administration follows through, it would leave intact a permanent injunction issued by U.S. District Judge James Wesley Hendrix of the Northern District of Texas blocking enforcement of major NFA registration, application, and approval requirements against the covered plaintiffs, members, and customers.

That is a substantial development.

But it is not the same thing as a nationwide judicial ruling removing suppressors from the NFA.

And for the larger constitutional fight, that distinction may be just as important as the victory itself.

The NFA’s Taxing-Power Foundation Just Cracked

The case began with a simple constitutional problem created by Congress itself.

When the National Firearms Act was enacted in 1934, Congress structured it as a tax law. The registration, application, recordkeeping, and approval requirements surrounding suppressors, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and other regulated firearms existed to support collection of federal taxes.

That changed when the One Big Beautiful Bill Act reduced the federal making and transfer tax on suppressors, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and “any other weapons” to $0, effective January 1, 2026.

Congress left most of the regulatory machinery in place.

Judge Hendrix concluded in his August 5 opinion that the government could no longer rely on Congress’s taxing power to support regulations tied to a tax that produces no revenue.

The court held that the challenged provisions exceed Congress’s enumerated powers as applied to the now-untaxed firearms.

That includes major provisions governing registration, applications to make and transfer firearms, and criminal penalties tied to failing to comply with those requirements.

The court then permanently barred ATF, DOJ, and their officials—including successors in office—from enforcing the challenged provisions against the covered plaintiffs and, where applicable, their current and future members and customers.

The temporary seven-day stay expired August 13, putting the injunction into effect.

“This ruling exposed a structural weakness in the NFA that has been hiding in plain sight for decades,” said Texas Gun Rights Foundation President Chris McNutt. “The federal government defended this regulatory system as part of a tax. Once that tax became zero, a federal court concluded that the government could not keep the burdensome registration scheme while pretending the constitutional justification for it was still intact.”

No Appeal Could Preserve the Win—but Limit the Precedent

The reported decision not to appeal creates an unusual legal tradeoff.

If DOJ allows the October 5 appeal deadline to pass, Judge Hendrix’s judgment remains binding on the federal defendants with respect to the parties protected by the injunction.

That gives those plaintiffs real, enforceable relief.

But because the government would not take the case to the Fifth Circuit, there would be no appellate decision adopting Judge Hendrix’s reasoning as binding precedent throughout Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.

That matters for the larger legal campaign.

A district court opinion can be persuasive to other judges, but it does not bind other federal district courts or courts of appeals. Another court confronting the same NFA argument could agree with Hendrix—or reject his reasoning.

That means the fight over the NFA’s zero-tax structure may increasingly move through other cases and other jurisdictions.

The American Suppressor Association’s current case status notes that no notice of appeal has been filed and identifies October 5 as the government’s appeal deadline. It also notes that reports indicate DOJ has chosen not to appeal, while the Department has not yet formalized that position on the court record.

For now, the Texas judgment stands.

It just does not stand for everyone.

This Does Not Yet Remove Suppressors From the NFA

That limitation is critical.

The court did not issue a universal nationwide injunction.

Its order protects the named plaintiffs and, where applicable, their agencies, political subdivisions, organizational members, commercial members, and customers—including current and future members and customers.

The court expressly declined to extend relief to everyone in the country.

Suppressors also remain listed as “firearms” under the current text of the National Firearms Act in 26 U.S.C. § 5845.

They remain firearms under the separate Gun Control Act as well. Federal law continues to define a firearm to include “any firearm muffler or firearm silencer” in 18 U.S.C. § 921.

That means the Texas ruling should not be reduced to “suppressors are federally unregulated.”

They are not.

For covered suppressor transactions, the injunction attacks the NFA registration and approval structure. It does not erase the Gun Control Act, prohibited-person laws, ordinary federal firearms-dealer requirements, or applicable state law.

Machine guns and destructive devices are also in a different position because Congress retained the $200 making and transfer taxes on those categories.

The Court Never Reached the Second Amendment

There is another major limitation—and potentially another major opportunity for future litigation.

Judge Hendrix did not hold that suppressor regulation violates the Second Amendment.

The plaintiffs raised Second Amendment claims, but the court concluded that it did not need to reach them after deciding the case under Article I.

That leaves several constitutional questions unresolved.

Among them: whether suppressors are protected “Arms” or components of protected arms for Second Amendment purposes, what historical tradition could support imposing special federal registration on them, and whether the government can subject commonly possessed firearm accessories to a regulatory system originally designed to suppress ownership through taxation.

Those questions remain available for future cases.

The Fifth Circuit has already confronted one suppressor-related Second Amendment challenge in United States v. Peterson. In that case, the court declined to invalidate the NFA on the record before it, while expressly stating that its ruling did not foreclose another litigant from successfully challenging the statute’s requirements.

That means Silencer Shop Foundation does something important without resolving everything.

It demonstrates that major portions of the federal suppressor-registration regime can fail on constitutional grounds before a court even reaches the Second Amendment.

What This Means for the Larger Suppressor Fight

The larger fight to remove suppressors from the NFA now has several distinct paths.

First, the Texas injunction provides a functioning real-world example of suppressor transactions occurring without the traditional NFA registration process for people and transactions protected by the order.

That matters because it separates two questions that were previously treated as one: whether suppressors can remain subject to ordinary federal firearms law and whether they also require the extraordinary registration machinery of the NFA.

Second, the ruling attacks the NFA at its constitutional foundation.

For nearly a century, the federal government defended the Act as a taxation system. Judge Hendrix concluded that once Congress eliminated the relevant tax, the associated regulations could no longer survive on that constitutional theory.

Third, because the ruling is limited rather than nationwide, additional litigation can still test the same theory elsewhere.

Those cases could produce agreement among federal courts, disagreement among circuits, or eventually appellate precedent addressing issues the Texas district court alone cannot settle nationwide.

And fourth, the Second Amendment question remains open.

For suppressor deregulation litigation, that means the August victory is not necessarily the end of the constitutional argument. It may instead remove one layer of the NFA while leaving courts to confront the deeper question of whether the federal government can continue treating suppressors as specially restricted arms or firearm components at all.

“Getting rid of a $200 tax was never the whole issue,” McNutt said. “The larger constitutional problem is forcing Americans through a federal registry and permission system before they can acquire ordinary firearms technology. This ruling shows that once the government’s taxing rationale disappears, the rest of that structure becomes much harder to defend.”

The reported decision not to appeal therefore matters for more than the people immediately protected by the injunction.

It leaves a federal judgment in place declaring major NFA provisions unconstitutional as applied to untaxed firearms. It allows the practical effects of that judgment to continue. And it gives future litigants a detailed constitutional roadmap for attacking the same registration structure.

But it does not mean the NFA has disappeared, that every American is covered by the injunction, or that the Supreme Court has settled the status of suppressors.

The next phase is likely to be fought over the scope of this injunction, similar challenges in other courts, the remaining Gun Control Act restrictions, and eventually the unresolved Second Amendment question.

For nearly 90 years, suppressor owners faced the NFA as a single, largely intact federal system.

That system now has a significant constitutional fracture running through it.

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