This is long overdue. The Trump administration just posted new rules that move suppressor exports from the State Department's restrictive USML list to the Commerce Department's more business-friendly CCL. This is a huge win for American suppressor makers who have been fighting this bureaucratic nonsense for over a decade.
Here's the deal: exporting suppressors was a nightmare under State Department rules. The paperwork and restrictions made it economically impractical to sell American-made suppressors overseas. Meanwhile, in most of the world, suppressors are as common as hearing aids — hunters and sport shooters in Europe buy them at their local hardware store. Now our manufacturers can actually compete for that business.
The article mentions that Congress already dropped the stupid $200 tax on suppressor purchases. But suppressors are still stuck on the NFA, which means more paperwork and waiting periods for our customers. We're still fighting for the Hearing Protection Act to fully remove suppressors from the NFA entirely.
Let's be clear about something: a suppressor isn't some Hollywood silencer that makes a gun whisper-quiet. It reduces the report to below 140 decibels — the threshold where you suffer instant, permanent hearing damage. These are hearing protection devices, plain and simple.
Kudos to NSSF for pushing this for years, and to the Commerce and State Departments for finally getting it done.