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WASHINGTON, D.C. — The National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), the firearm industry trade association, is celebrating a major regulatory win after the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) formally rescinded the Biden administration’s export restrictions on firearms, ammunition, and related components.
The Final Rule, titled Revisions of Firearms License Requirements, was posted in the Federal Register and completely overturns the Interim Final Rule (IFR) imposed under the Biden administration in 2024.
That policy had throttled U.S. firearm exports, slashing the lifespan of export licenses, piling on red tape, and costing the industry an estimated $500 million annually.
NSSF’s Pushback Pays Off
NSSF led the charge against the restrictions from day one, representing firearm, ammunition, and component manufacturers and exporters.
The association worked with Capitol Hill lawmakers and the Trump administration to reverse the IFR, which critics argued did nothing to improve foreign public safety but effectively crippled American businesses in global markets.
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“The firearm industry is tremendously grateful to the Trump administration and BIS officials for their actions to restore American competitiveness,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President and General Counsel.
“Removing these restrictions will restore access to foreign markets while continuing to maintain adequate export controls to prevent illegal firearm trafficking,” he added.
Key Rollbacks in the Final Rule
The new BIS rule reinstates key elements of the export framework that existed before 2024, including:
- Restoring four-year export licenses (instead of the one-year limit under the Biden rule).
- Eliminating the “presumption of denial” for commercial sales to 36 countries previously blacklisted.
- Ending case-by-case license reviews that elevated “human rights” considerations above U.S. national security and foreign policy priorities.
BIS emphasized that strong export controls remain in place, with interagency authority to deny applications involving unlawful end uses or threats to national security.
The Bigger Picture
The Biden-era IFR followed a so-called “90-day pause” in 2023 that froze all firearm exports, later stretched to over six months. That pause and the restrictive rule that followed effectively dismantled the Export Control Reforms originally crafted under the Obama administration and finalized under President Trump.
With the Final Rule now official, the firearm industry expects to see renewed access to international markets, greater stability for American exporters, and the reversal of years of financial losses inflicted by the Biden-era policy.
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