Congress quietly removes federal oversight from non-lethal weapons
S. 3514 — Less Than Lethal Act · Filed by John Barrasso (R-WY) · 5 cosponsors · Introduced Dec 16, 2025 · Referred to committee
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What it does
This bill exempts less-than-lethal projectile devices (like stun guns, bean-bag rounds, and similar non-lethal weapons) from federal excise taxes and from regulation under the National Firearms Act. It defines qualifying devices as those incapable of firing ammunition faster than 500 feet per second and not designed to cause death or serious injury, and requires the Treasury Secretary to maintain and annually update a public list of approved devices.
Why we flagged it
The bill's operative mechanism is a dual exemption: removal of federal excise tax on less-than-lethal devices and exclusion from National Firearms Act regulation. This is fundamentally a deregulation and tax relief measure, not a public-safety enhancement or consumer-protection statute.
What the text implies
- Removal of NFA registration and background-check requirements for less-than-lethal devices may create a regulatory arbitrage: individuals barred from purchasing firearms could acquire less-lethal weapons without federal oversight or record-keeping.
- The 500 feet-per-second velocity threshold is a technical boundary that may be subject to manufacturer gaming—devices engineered to stay just below the threshold while maximizing lethality.
The full analysis lists 5 implications of this text.
Who stands to gain
manufacturers of less-than-lethal weapons and projectiles; retailers of non-lethal self-defense devices; consumers purchasing less-than-lethal weapons (tax savings)