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Interesting things are happening in the Fifth Circuit case involving silencers, USA v Peterson. A three-judge panel ruled that silencers were not “arms” as defined by the text of the Second Amendment. Peterson and his attorneys have asked the case be reheard in an en banc review. The Fifth Circuit has been reasonably diligent in its Second Amendment cases, so an en banc (review by the whole court) has a good chance of reversing the three-judge panel. The Peterson case appears to be seriously considered by the Fifth Circuit. The court has sent a request to the parties involved to...

The Hearing Protection Act has been re-introduced in 2025. The act removes silencers/gun mufflers from the National Firearms Act and places them in the same category as rifles and shotguns. The introduced act does this by adding silencers/gun mufflers to applicable laws that now cover firearms, more specifically, rifles and shotguns, and removing them from the National Firearms Act.Hearing Protection Act has Of 2025In Title 18, United States Code, in section 922(b) —(A) in paragraph (1), by striking “shotgun or rifle” the first place it appears and inserting “shotgun, rifle, firearms silencer or firearm muffler”; and(B) in paragraph (3) by...

On November 18, 2024, the American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery issued a statement of support for the use of firearms suppressors as a means of reducing the risk of hearing loss. From entnet.org: The American Academy of Otolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery endorses the use of firearm suppressors as an effective method of reducing the risk of hearing loss, especially when used in conjunction with conventional hearing protective measures.The article contains a paragraph clarifying that the publication and organization are not making a legal or political statement. They are stating a medical fact.The references listed with the statement make...

The number of legal suppressors in the USA is almost certainly over five million. The National Shooting Sports Federation (NSSF) revealed a Freedom of Information Act request submitted to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which was finally answered this summer. The total number was 4.86 million at the end of July 2024. From the NSSF: In a recent Freedom of Information Act request (FOIA), NSSF received from ATF the additional number of silencers from May 2021 to July 2024. An incredible 2,193,123 more suppressors are protecting the hearing of hunters and shooters. That means a whopping...

CRIME Published December 4, 2024 9:55am EST | Updated December 4, 2024 11:11am EST UnitedHealthcare CEO fatally shot outside Manhattan hotel, no arrests UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was shot in the chest By Danielle Wallace , Alexis McAdams FOXBusiness NYPD Crime Scene Unit arrives at the scene where United Healthcare CEO was shot to death in Manhattan A van arrives near the Hilton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan where 50 year-old, Brian Thompson was murdered. (Julia Bonavita/Fox News Digital) NEW YORK, N.Y. – UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson was fatally shot outside the Hilton Hotel in Midtown Manhattan on Wednesday morning, Fox...

In October, the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the gun industry’s trade association, reported that Americans owned 4.9 million silencers as of July 2024 according to data provided by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).1 Compared to previous reporting, this updated total reflects an alarming surge in silencer sales: In the first six months of 2024 alone, Americans purchased and registered a staggering 1.4 million silencers.The data shows that between May 2021 and July 2024, a mere three-year span, Americans accumulated nearly as many silencers as were registered in the previous 87 years — since the National...

On June 21, 2024, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit issued a unanimous opinion against Ken Paxton, the Attorney General of the State of Texas, and three individual plaintiffs. The ruling stopped the challenge to the National Firearms Act federal regulation of silencers, at least for the present. The opinion was not about the merits of the case. It was based solely on the plaintiffs’ standing to sue. The case is Paxon v Dettelbach. From the opinion:First, the declarations do not state any intention to engage in conduct proscribed by law. Rather, the declarations state only that the Individual...

Brandon Maddox and Silencer Central is an American success story. Brandon went from a Federal Firearms License (FFL) in his home to the largest silencer dealer in the USA. Today, Brandon’s companies dominate the silencer/suppressor market, regulated under the National Firearms Act (NFA). This correspondent met Brandon Maddox at the 2024 SHOT Show. Brandon had read several AmmoLand articles, recognized this writer, and started a conversation. Brandon graciously agreed to be interviewed. This is the second in a series of articles resulting from several interviews. Quotes have been lightly edited for clarity.Silencers are currently regulated under the National Firearms Act...

The lawsuit by the State of Texas, challenging the federal requirement to pay taxes and register homemade silencers, is moving forward in the Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit. Oral arguments are scheduled for April 29, 2024. The case is now known as Paxton v Dettelbach. On February 24, 2022, Ken Paxton, the Texas Attorney General, filed suit against the acting head of the ATF, then Marvin Richardson. The lawsuit was required by Texas law. HB 957 became law in Texas on September 1, 2021. On July 15, 2022, Paxton, acting for the State of Texas, amended the lawsuit...

The oral arguments in the Paxton v Dettelbach case, will be heard at the Fifth Circuit Courthouse in New Orleans on Wednesday morning at 9:00. Texas AG Ken Paxton is challenging the power of the federal government to tax and require serial numbers on homemade silencers which are made and stay in Texas. The case is bolstered by the Bruen decision at the Supreme Court. Paxton says silencers are protected under the Second Amendment, the Tenth Amendment, and the Fourteenth Amendment, and there is no historical tradition requireing American citizens to serialize and pay a $200 tax to exercise their...

>Courtesy Open Source DefenseExponential curves like the one above don’t just stop. The consumer demand (for suppressors) is there, and it’s accelerating. And that’s happening just as NFA wait times are coming down. From the NSSF:Updated times announced today by ATF show the average wait time on a paper NFA Form 4 — the most popular NFA form submitted — dropped to an average of 245 days for processing, while average daily processing times for electronic eForm 4’s dropped to 53 days. Previously, wait times on Form 4’s were near 280 days for paper form processing and between 90 and...

On February 15, 2024, a plea agreement was reached in the silencer case in the Western District of Louisiana. In the case, Brennan James Comeaux had been charged with possession of five homemade silencers, two silver-colored and three black-colored. A warrant had been issued to search Comeax’s home to find the silencers, based on probable cause. A motion to dismiss had been filed in the case, contending the portions of the National Firearms Act (NFA) and later statutes violated the Second Amendment of the Constitution based on the guidance of the Bruen decision published by the Supreme Court on June...

Brandon Maddox and Silencer Central is an American success story. Brandon went from a Federal Firearms License (FFL) in his home to the largest silencer dealer in the USA. Today, Brandon’s companies dominate the silencer/suppressor market, regulated under the National Firearms Act (NFA). This correspondent met Brandon Maddox at the 2024 SHOT Show. Brandon had read several AmmoLand articles, recognized this writer, and started a conversation. Brandon graciously agreed to be interviewed. This is the first in a series of articles resulting from several interviews.Brandon was born in Alabama. His father spent a tour in the Army after a Reserve...

On September 7, 2023, Brennan Comeaux was arrested for possessing unregistered silencers without serial numbers. He was appointed a federal defender in Louisiana in the United States District Court for the Western District of Louisiana. Louisiana is in the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals.On December 20, 2023, a motion to dismiss was filed by Comeaux’s attorney. From the Motion to Dismiss:By indictment, the government accuses Brennan Comeaux of possessing unregistered firearms in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861(d) (Count One) and receiving and possessing firearms unidentified by serial number in violation of 26 U.S.C. § 5861(i). ECF 1. Specifically, the...

A close friend told me of a high school field trip he went on in 1975. The trip was to a slaughterhouse in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. There, he encountered a Maxim Silencer attached to a .22 single-shot pistol. The Maxim and pistol were displayed on the wall. The display said the silenced pistol had been used to slaughter over two million cattle before it was retired, presumably when a captive bolt system was substituted. Research revealed Sioux Falls was close to where my friend went to school. It has a huge slaughterhouse industry, started in 1909. The number of...

In the United States District Court for the Southern District of Illinois, on November 25, 2022, Larry Morse and Theodore Ray Buck, Jr. filed a lawsuit against the state of Illinois, claiming the state ban on the sale and possession of silencers violates the Second Amendment. A similar lawsuit was filed by Carlin Anderson and David Clark on February 27, 2023, backed by the American Suppressor Association. The two lawsuits, Morse v Raoul and Anderson v Raoul, have been consolidated as of June 15, 2023. The parties involved have agreed the principle area of contention is whether silencers are arms...

On July 18, Judge Mark T. Pittman of the Northern District of Texas, Fort Worth Division, ruled the plaintiffs in the case of Ken Paxton v. Gary M. Restaino (Previously Dettleback, the case name changes with the name of the head of the ATF) have no standing to pursue the lawsuit, because they have not suffered concrete harm. The case is dismissed without prejudice, which means it can be refiled with new evidence. The case is the result of the passage of Texas bill HB 957. The bill required the Attorney General of Texas to file a lawsuit challenging the...

The number of legal suppressors or silencers in the United States shows they are in common use for lawful purposes. As of January of 2023, the ATF shows there were over 3.1 million silencers or suppressors legally owned in the United States for lawful purposes. In January of 2020, there were 1.8 million. Over the last three years, the number of legal suppressors has increased by an average of 450,000 suppressors per year. By the end of 2023, it is reasonably expected there will be over 3.6 million suppressors in the United States of America. To own these suppressors, the...

On January 18, 2023, at the SHOT Show, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) hosted a slide show on what has been happening in the National Firearms Act Division of the ATF. This presentation did not explain the ramifications of the controversial “new rule” on stabilizing pistol braces. It was an overview of the internal happenings in the NFA division of the ATF.This correspondent has seen many such presentations in other organizations in his career. There is useful information to be gained. Do not expect bureaucracies to air their “dirty laundry” in public. Each agency and each...

If you have ever thought you might want, need or find useful a suppressed firearm, there is good news. .22 rifles with threaded barrels are available for very little money.There are several reasons why you might consider buying inexpensive .22 rifles with threaded barrels:Affordability: .22 rifles are generally less expensive than other types of firearms, and a threaded barrel can add versatility without significantly increasing the cost.Versatility: A threaded barrel allows for the attachment of various accessories such as suppressors, compensators, and muzzle brakes.Recoil: .22 caliber firearms have less recoil than larger caliber firearms, making it ideal for beginners and...