The ATF has restarted publishing the Firearms Commerce report in the United States. The report for 2024 was published in May 2025, which is the “normal” time for the report to be published. One of the insidious actions during the Biden administration was the deliberate hiding of information from the American public.
The Firearms Commerce in the United States Statistical Update has been continually published from 2011 to 2021.
Under the Biden administration, publication of the report stopped. There was no announcement. When questioned about it, staff from the ATF claimed there was no change. The report would be published as normal. The report was never published. No report was published in 2022, 2023, or 2024. The publication of the 2024 report is a welcome return to normalcy.
The 2021 report showed total firearms manufactured from 1986 to 2019, while the 2024 report shows firearms manufactured from 2013 to 2023. The number of firearms manufactured lags behind other reports because the information is considered sensitive and could be used for competitive advantage. Therefore, it is withheld for a year.
Somewhere, a decision was made to show only the previous 11 years of data, from 2013 to 2023. The data overlaps with data from previous reports, so it is all available.
The 2024 report shows a drop in firearms manufactured in the United States from 2022 to 2023. In 2022, the number was reported as 13,395,031. In 2023, the total was reported as 9,772,259, a drop of 27%.
There are some areas that deserve further attention. The 2024 report shows a total number of registered silencers of 3,536,623 as of May 2024. In May of 2021, the number was reported as 2,664,774. Less than a million additional silencers registered over those three years seems to contradict some other reporting.
The NSSF obtained information showing 4.8 million silencers registered to Americans as of July 2024, with 2,193,123 added from May 2021 to July 2024. It is probably a reporting glitch. This correspondent suspects the number of registered silencers is over 5 million at present.
The number of short barreled shotguns registered with the ATF increased from 162,267 to 165,180 from the 2021 report to the 2024 report. It is a very small increase. This is explained with the ATF ruling that pistol grip firearms over 26.1 inches long, chambered for shotgun shells, are not technically “shotguns”, but are simply firearms. Bullpup shotguns such as the Keltec KSG, KS7, and KS410 have significant magazine capacities, are just over 26 inches long, and have shoulder stocks. They do not require payment of a $200 tax and all the intrusive National Firearms Act (NFA) paperwork. The Taurus Judge and Smith & Wesson Governor revolvers, which fire both .45 Colt and .410 cartridges ,are available. There is little reason to manufacture and register NFA short barreled shotguns when those alternatives can be acquired without the $200 tax.
The Biden administration was one of the least transparent administrations in history. While talking to radio show host Russ Clark, this correspondent traded anecdotes on the difficulty of obtaining information from the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the FBI, and the ATF. The information was previously easily available over the Internet.
The return of the Firearms Commerce in the United States is a welcome example of the return to transparency with the Trump administration.
So far, reports that would normally have been published in 2022, 2023, and 2024 remain missing. They may never be reconstructed. This correspondent would like to see the missing reports published for historical continuity and as a check on accuracy. Mistakes that would be caught in annual reports can be missed when a span of three years is unreported.
About Dean Weingarten:
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.
