The legislation was was originally intended to remove suppressors from National Firearms Act (NFA) regulation.  The NFA - which dates from the 1930s, and was (stop me if any of this sounds familiar) a reaction to the Prohibition-related violence between gangs that were serving the illicit booze market - regulates things like machine guns, sawed-off shotguns, rifles with barrels shorter than 16 inches, and...suppressors.  The NFA doesn't ban those items, per se, but it does require would-be purchasers to jump through some legal hoops and pay a $200 tax.  

Suppressors aren't "silencers"; contrary to anti-gun movement paranoia, they don't make guns silent; that's just in the movies.  

What they do is reduce the literally deafening crack of a bullet leaving the muzzle; the sound of un-suppressed firearms can easily damage hearing, even with less-than-thorough ear protectin. In much of the world, while guns are strictly regulated, suppressors are considered accessories; they are actually required for hunting in Finland.  

Suppressors don't make citizens into silent assassins.  They do help prevent deafness.  The common sense case is pretty airtight, and the new Administration's attitude on pointless regulations is encouraging.  

So this session of Congress started out with some hope.   

Gun Owners hoped that the Committee would have removed suppressors from the National Firearms Act of 1934 (NFA), but to their dismay, suppressors were not removed. The HPA goal was to remove suppressors from the NFA, but the competing version of the HPA, led by Representative David Kustoff, that would have lowered the tax stamp fee to $5 was also floated. It seems a compromise was reached, which would drop the tax fee to $0 for a transfer of a suppressor but still require registration with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) under the NFA.

The results of this plan?  Not, shall we say, as satisfying as a steak and tumbler of scotch at the end of a long week:

Gun owners who want to make their suppressors via ATF Form 1 will still need to pay a $200 tax stamp fee. They will also still need to submit passport photos and fingerprints and undergo enhanced background checks. The waiting period for the ATF to complete its investigation will also remain necessary. The tax stamp fees for suppressors were the lesser of the issues that most gun owners had with buying suppressors. The most pressing issues remain.

So to recap, the choices are:

• Remove suppressors from the NFA list altogether
• Keep them on the NFA list; lower or eliminate the tax, but continue the legal hoop jumping and registration of the accessories with the Feds.  

The choice of the 2nd Amendment movement should be obvious enough, right?

Almost all gun rights organizations supported the removal of suppressors from the NFA. The most prominent organizations that pushing for the HPA passage were the American Suppressor Association (ASA), Gun Owners of America (GOA), and the National Rifle Association (NRA). GOA launched a public pressure campaign that flooded Congressional phone lines.

Shooters are not happy with the current state of the compromise:  long story short, registration is bad.  

Representative Kustoff (R, TN CD8) is defending his approach:

I am committed to the fight for full removal of suppressors from the NFA, as well as other long overdue reforms to unconstitutional restrictions on law-abiding gun owners. pic.twitter.com/65DbqBiHi4

— Rep. David Kustoff (@RepDavidKustoff) May 12, 2025

If you have a stake in this issue, calling one's representative would be in order.  

Since gun law liberalization is in play, the Violence Policy Center - the anti-gun lobby's junk-science mill - is doing what it was established to do; peddle a bogus "study" about suppressors which tries to invert the issue from "protecting aural health" to "creating ninja assassins":

In fact, in the study, VPC claims that hearing protection has nothing to do with federal legislation that would remove suppressors from being regulated under the National Firearms Act (NFA).

“In their public statements, proponents of the bills would like the public and policymakers to believe that silencers are innocuous devices used merely to protect the hearing of shooters, including children,” the VPC report stated. “But in fact, the campaign to deregulate silencers is just the latest attempt by the gun lobby and firearms industry to market yet another military-bred product with little concern for its impact on public safety.”

What the VPC won’t tell readers of its report is that suppressors are required for shooting in many countries. Not only do they protect the hearing of the person shooting the suppressed firearm, but they also protect the hearing of bystanders who can sustain damage from the loud blast.

The Violence Policy Center is to violence policy, of course, what the American Civil Liberties Union has become to civil liberties in America, or what the Southern Poverty Law Center is regarding poverty law in the south - a chanting point mill for Big Left.  

While either of the proposed changes to the existing law would be an improvement, it seems reasonable that a majority that was sent to DC on a wave of anti-regulatory sentiment, should actually cut pointless regulations.