Suppressors aren't what we're told they are by Hollywood. They don't make guns silent. They simply reduce the noise by a certain factor, depending on the suppressor in question.
But the anti-gunners have been trying very hard to demonize the blasted things, especially as suppressors are about to get $200 cheaper for anyone who wants one.
Over at The Hill, they recently ran a student-written op-ed lamenting this fact, though.
In 2019, a gunman shot and killed 12 people in a Virginia Beach municipal building. His semiautomatic weapon was fitted with a silencer, making the gunshots sound, to one survivor, “like a nail gun.”
If the shots had been louder — if the people inside had been given even 30 more seconds of warning — lives could have perhaps been saved. But muffled sounds from the silencer created confusion and, ultimately, death.
Silencers are dangerous. Now, they’re more accessible than ever.
...
For nearly a century, silencers, also called suppressors, were subject to a $200 tax and required a federal registration process with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. The goal wasn’t to ban them outright, but to treat them with caution and scrutiny.
By removing the tax, the bill treats them like ordinary firearm accessories. With the federal tax removed, the financial and procedural barriers that once slowed down silencer purchases are gone, making it easier and potentially faster to obtain them. In effect, this policy turns silencers into impulse buys available with minimal oversight, even in states with already loose gun laws.
Minimal oversight?
Anyone looking to buy a suppressor will still have to go through the entire NFA process, which amounts to two background checks, as I understand it, and otherwise get the go-ahead from the ATF.
There's more oversight on suppressors, even after the Hearing Protection Act, than for most firearms.
And I find it funny how the author, Dartmouth student Sally Young, invokes Virginia Beach to make her point here. That was six years ago. Sure, it was high profile, but there are about 4.5 million suppressors in private hands. If these were such horrific things, then just how come she can't invoke something more recent?
I don't suppose she'd want to bring up the assassination of UnitedHealth CEO Brian Thompson. Luigi Mangione, the accused killer, reportedly used a homemade suppressor, thus skirting all the NFA laws. That one doesn't really advance the narrative that the tax stamp keeps suppressors out of evil hands, now does it?
But why would Young possibly want to mislead the public like that? After all, that's precisely what this communications and public policy major is doing here. She's misleading everyone to think that the laws on suppressors are opening up, and we'll be able to order them on Amazon or something.
What does she have to gain by doing something like that?
The author is a comms intern for Brady, I'd expect nothing less than falshoods and propaganda. pic.twitter.com/YQ12ggezNP
— QuestionEverything (@naildrivermetal) July 28, 2025
Oh.
Well.
That explains everything, doesn't it?
It should be noted that The Hill failed to disclose that little tidbit completely.
I'm not saying they shouldn't have run it. Not because she's the comms intern for a gun control group, anyway. They probably should have declined to run it because it had poor reasoning, but that's not what The Hill cares about, and that's fine.
But they should have disclosed that this is someone who is working with a gun control group. That's something the readers deserve to know about the author. This isn't someone who has tried to take a dispassionate view of the issue and reached a particular conclusion, but someone who has a profound bias, one significant enough to seek out an opportunity to work with an activist organization pushing a particular point of view on the topic.
The bias isn't the issue in and of itself. It's an op-ed, after all. Bias is fine there.
But the readers deserve the disclosure.
Shame on The Hill for either omitting it or for failing to demand its inclusion from Young.
Editor's Note: The mainstream media continues to deflect, gaslight, spin, and lie about gun owners, the Second Amendment, and the goals of the gun control lobby.
Help us continue to expose their anti-2A bias by reading news you can trust. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to get 60% off your membership.
Join the conversation as a VIP Member