By Tanya Metaksa
What’s New— Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch supports 2027 legislation to clarify state law regarding suppressor restrictions; Banking Access and the Firearms Industry: From Operation Choke Point to Trump’s Fair-Banking Reforms; Everytown’s Candidates for Congress and who to support.
State Legislatures: Still in Session:
States in session through December 31, 2026: Michigan, New Jersey, and Ohio. Pennsylvania’s session runs through Nov. 30, 2027. These legislatures may come back into session after the election.
Mississippi
Attorney General Fitch’s Suppressor Decision Deserves Support—and Legislative Follow-Through
Mississippi Attorney General Lynn Fitch announced on Oct. 12 that, in her office’s opinion, ATF Form 4 is voluntary for suppressors under Mississippi law following the federal agency’s Oct. 9 change in enforcement policy. She also committed to seeking statutory changes during the 2027 legislative session. That second step deserves as much attention as the first.
The distinction is durability. Fitch has interpreted existing state law in light of current federal guidance. She has not repealed Mississippi’s suppressor restrictions, and the federal policy on which her interpretation rests could change under another administration. Her statement expressly recognizes that vulnerability.
Clarifying the Present Rules
Mississippi Code Section 97-37-31 ties lawful suppressor manufacture, sale, and possession to being “duly authorized under federal law.” According to Fitch’s statement, that language created uncertainty after the federal district court’s decision in Silencer Shop Foundation v. BATFE. The injunction protected specified plaintiffs and associated parties; it was not an unrestricted ruling covering everyone.
Fitch explained that ATF subsequently adopted a broader enforcement policy, making Form 4 voluntary. Her office concluded that Mississippi’s reference to federal authorization should operate consistently with that guidance. The practical value is straightforward: the state’s chief legal officer has supplied an interpretation addressing uncertainty in a statute carrying criminal consequences.
That is a sound exercise of leadership. Citizens and businesses should not have to navigate an unresolved conflict between changing federal policy and state language that points back to federal law.
Turning Guidance Into Lasting Reform
But administrative relief is not the same as statutory protection. Fitch proposes removing the federal-law reference from Mississippi’s statute and reviewing related restrictions. She specifically identified Section 97-37-1, which her statement describes as penalizing concealed carry of a firearm muffler or silencer. She credited the NRA and American Suppressor Association with helping identify necessary amendments.
Those proposals recognize that reform requires more than announcing a favorable interpretation. Related provisions must be examined together. Otherwise, uncertainty can survive in a neighboring section of the code even after the central issue appears resolved.
Fitch deserves support for addressing both the immediate question and the unfinished legislative work. Her approach offers present clarification without pretending that guidance provides permanent security.
In the next legislative session, the Legislature should seriously examine the proposed amendments, define lawful conduct plainly, and remove unnecessary dependence on shifting federal enforcement choices. A favorable interpretation matters. Clear statutory language would give Mississippi gun owners a firmer foundation.
New York: New York enacts expanded storage and ammunition restrictions — A.1962-B/S.9629 and S.7236/A.7983
Governor Kathy Hochul signed “Francesco’s Law,” expanding secure-storage requirements for firearms when not in use and strengthening consequences when minors or unlicensed individuals obtain unsecured guns. She also signed legislation aligning ammunition-purchase eligibility with firearm restrictions, including restrictions applicable to people subject to temporary or extreme-risk protection orders. The governor’s announcement identifies the ammunition measure as S.7236/A.7983 in its heading, although its body contains an inconsistent Assembly number.
Why it matters: The storage measure reaches beyond households already containing children or prohibited persons, substantially broadening the practical compliance obligation described by the governor. The ammunition measure links access to ammunition more closely to firearm eligibility; both changes warrant attention to implementing guidance and any ensuing constitutional challenges. The announcement alone should not be used to establish every exception or effective-date provision.
Trump Administration
DOJ investigates firearm-permitting delays
Middletown and Waterbury, Connecticut; no court case announced
On Oct. 22, the Justice Department opened investigations into whether the two municipal police departments unnecessarily delay firearm permits or deny qualified applicants and force them into potentially years-long appeals. DOJ expressly invoked Bruen’s warning that lengthy processing times can effectively deny the right to public carry; the announcement describes an investigation, not a finding of liability or a filed lawsuit.
Why it matters: This is a significant civil-rights enforcement development focused on administration of licensing systems rather than the facial validity of permit requirements. It puts processing delays and appeal practices—not merely statutory eligibility criteria—at the center of federal Second Amendment scrutiny.
Banking Access and the Firearms Industry
From Operation Choke Point to Trump’s Fair-Banking Reforms
An account from November 2008 through October 22, 2026
A lawful firearms business can hold the necessary licenses, comply with federal and state law, and still encounter a different barrier to doing business: a bank unwilling to provide financing, payment processing, or other essential financial services because of the industry in which it operates. Congressional investigations and, most recently, an October 2026 federal banking review have documented restrictions affecting firearms businesses. The controversy centers on debanking—and on whether banking decisions reflect measurable financial risks, government pressure, or opposition to lawful commerce.
The history, however, requires an important distinction. The evidence does not establish a single, uninterrupted government directive, beginning in 2008 and continuing unchanged to the present, to exclude firearms businesses from banking. It instead shows an evolving combination of payment-processing guidance, disputed regulatory pressure, private bank restrictions, and successive attempts to prevent lawful businesses from being excluded for political or reputational reasons. President Trump’s administration is now addressing both regulatory practices and banks’ own exclusionary policies, although its reforms do not guarantee every firearms business a bank account or loan.
The Origins: Payment-Processing Oversight After 2008
The regulatory background reaches back to November 2008, when the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation issued guidance on banks’ relationships with third-party payment processors. These intermediaries process payments for merchants, including businesses selling products by telephone or online. The guidance addressed potential fraud and the need for additional due diligence and monitoring; its existence alone does not establish an anti-firearms policy.
The more consequential firearms connection emerged in the FDIC’s summer 2011 Supervisory Insights publication and subsequent guidance. The agency identified categories of merchants associated with higher-risk payment activity, including firearms and ammunition businesses. According to the FDIC inspector general, the agency understood higher-risk activities to include businesses operating under complex or varying laws, selling products prohibited for certain consumers, or generating elevated complaints, returns, or chargebacks.
For firearms businesses, the problem was the movement from identifying risks to stigmatizing an entire industry. A December 2014 House Oversight Committee staff report criticized the placement of lawful firearms and ammunition sales alongside categories such as Ponzi schemes and other disreputable or unlawful activities. The report argued that the FDIC had not adequately explained why firearms merchants belonged on the list.
That classification could matter even without an explicit prohibition. A bank deciding whether to serve a firearms dealer had to consider not only the customer’s actual conduct but also the possibility that examiners would regard the relationship as troublesome. The inspector general later confirmed that references to particular merchant categories created a perception among some bank executives that the FDIC discouraged those relationships—although that perception was most pronounced for payday lenders.
Operation Choke Point: Antifraud Enforcement and Its Wider Consequences
The Justice Department developed Operation Choke Point internally in November 2012 and began issuing subpoenas in 2013. Its stated purpose was to investigate financial institutions and payment processors suspected of facilitating consumer fraud. The strategy focused on the financial intermediaries through which fraudulent merchants obtained access to the banking system.
The controversy concerned what happened beyond those investigations. Congressional critics argued that threatening scrutiny of financial intermediaries encouraged banks to abandon entire categories of customers, including lawful businesses that had not themselves been accused of wrongdoing. The House Oversight staff’s December 2014 report cited internal Justice Department communications indicating that banks were exiting “high-risk” lines of business.
The report also identified firearms-specific consequences. It described memoranda of understanding involving FDIC regional offices and bank policies submitted under consent orders that prohibited payment processing for firearms merchants, characterized firearms-dealer loans as “undesirable,” or subjected firearms and ammunition businesses to heightened due diligence. These findings gave the firearms industry’s objections a documentary basis beyond generalized complaints about unfavorable treatment.
The institutional concern was substantial: restrictions imposed through financial supervision could burden lawful commerce without Congress changing firearms law and without an adjudication that the affected merchant had violated it. A business could remain legally entitled to sell its products while finding the financial infrastructure needed to conduct those sales increasingly difficult to obtain.
What the Investigations Established—and What They Did Not
The strongest account of this history must also confront evidence that qualified the broader allegations.
In September 2015, the FDIC inspector general issued an audit examining the agency’s role in Operation Choke Point and its supervision of banks serving higher-risk merchants. The audit reviewed a nonstatistical sample of 23 financial institutions and included interviews with bank executives and agency personnel. It concluded that the FDIC’s involvement in the Justice Department initiative was limited and “inconsequential to the overall direction and outcome” of the operation.
The inspector general found no evidence that the FDIC used its high-risk merchant list to target financial institutions. More specifically, outside payday lending, the audit found no instances among the institutions reviewed in which the FDIC pressured a bank to deny services to a listed merchant. Interviewed bank executives likewise reported no such pressure to terminate banking relationships with firearms, ammunition, or tobacco retailers. Those findings were limited to the audit’s scope, but they directly constrain claims of a proven, comprehensive federal campaign against firearms banking.
At the same time, the audit did not vindicate every supervisory practice. It found conduct inconsistent with written FDIC policy and guidance, documented problematic use of supervisory influence concerning payday lending, and questioned whether the agency adequately controlled the use of “moral suasion”—informal efforts to influence bank decisions before formal enforcement became necessary.
The First Reversals—and Why the Controversy Continued
The FDIC began clarifying its position before Operation Choke Point formally ended. In July 2014, it removed merchant-category lists from relevant guidance and its informational article. The agency explained that banks should evaluate individual relationships rather than treat the examples as a categorical judgment against entire industries. Its guidance stated that properly managed relationships with lawful merchants were neither prohibited nor discouraged.
Under Trump’s first administration, the Justice Department formally confirmed Operation Choke Point’s termination in August 2017. Assistant Attorney General Stephen Boyd stated that the investigations were over, the initiative would not resume, and the department would not discourage financial services to lawful industries, expressly including firearms-related businesses.
Yet ending the federal initiative did not necessarily remove restrictions already embedded in private bank policies. The distinction is essential: a government can withdraw supervisory pressure without compelling a bank to abandon an independently adopted firearms policy. In October 2026, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), an independent bureau of the U.S. Department of the Treasury, published findings that demonstrated why that distinction matters. The OCC findings documented restrictive banking policies in effect from 2020 through September 2025, well after Operation Choke Point’s formal termination.
Trump’s Current Response: Objective Risk Rather Than Political Disfavor
On Aug. 7, 2025, President Trump issued Executive Order 14331, “Guaranteeing Fair Banking for All Americans.” It declared that banking decisions should rest on individualized, objective, risk-based analysis rather than political or religious beliefs or political opposition to lawful business activities. The order explicitly invoked Operation Choke Point as an example of the practices the administration sought to prevent. That characterization expresses the administration’s position; it does not erase the qualifications in the earlier inspector-general findings.
The order directed federal banking regulators to remove reputation-risk concepts that could facilitate politicized debanking from examination materials and guidance, consider regulatory amendments, and review institutions for potentially unlawful exclusionary practices. It also directed remedial action where authorized by existing law and provided targeted reinstatement and notification measures within the Small Business Administration’s lending framework.
The central policy change is an effort to separate actual banking risk from political controversy. A firearms manufacturer’s repayment capacity, legal compliance, or operational weaknesses remain legitimate subjects of bank assessment. The administration’s objection is to substituting disapproval of lawful firearms commerce for that assessment.
The 2026 Rule: Restraining Regulators
On April 7 of this year, the OCC and FDIC adopted a final rule codifying the removal of reputation risk from their supervisory programs. The rule prohibits those agencies from criticizing or taking adverse action against a supervised institution on that basis.
It also prohibits the agencies from requiring, instructing, or encouraging banks to close accounts or take other actions because of customers’ political, social, cultural, or religious views, constitutionally protected speech, or solely because of politically disfavored but lawful business activities perceived to create reputation risk.
For firearms businesses, that directly addresses the danger of a regulator informally communicating that an otherwise lawful customer is unacceptable because its business is controversial.
But the rule’s limit is equally important: the FDIC expressly states that it imposes no requirements or obligations on supervised banks themselves. It restricts regulatory conduct; it is not a universal command that banks serve every lawful applicant.
The October 2026 Findings: Evidence of Continuing Restrictions
On Oct. 14, the OCC released findings from its review of the nine largest national banks it supervises: JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Citibank, Wells Fargo, U.S. Bank, Capital One, PNC, TD Bank, and BMO. The review examined policies operating between 2020 and September 2025.
The OCC reported that all nine maintained policies of the kind under review and found that broad reputation-risk policies lacked clear standards and objective, risk-based criteria. It also identified public and nonpublic restrictions affecting sectors including firearms and ammunition manufacturing or distribution.
The “all nine” finding should not be overstated. It concerns the broader set of exclusionary policies examined, not a finding that every bank prohibited every type of firearms customer. The 2026 report summary identifies firearms-financing restrictions at several banks and describes examples of banks conditioning services on firearms-sales standards beyond governing law.
Those examples illustrate the practical stakes. When access to financing or securities services depends on adopting a bank’s preferred sales restrictions, financial institutions can influence firearms commerce without a legislative change. But evidence of a restrictive bank policy is not, by itself, proof that government officials coerced it or that it violated existing law. The OCC report did not itself adjudicate liability, announce an enforcement action, or comprehensively quantify affected customers and their losses.
An Unfinished Reform
The history is therefore neither a simple story of ordinary risk management nor a conclusively established, continuous government conspiracy beginning in 2008. It is a record of regulatory classifications that stigmatized lawful merchants, congressional findings of firearms-related restrictions, narrower inspector-general conclusions, and private banking policies that persisted after Operation Choke Point ended.
Trump’s current reforms address two different problems: preventing regulators from using political or reputational disfavor to influence customer relationships, and scrutinizing banks’ own exclusionary practices under existing legal authority. The first has produced a binding OCC–FDIC rule. The second has produced detailed supervisory findings and the prospect of further action, but not a general entitlement to banking services or established liability for every firearms-related denial. The executive order itself creates no privately enforceable right.
The appropriate measure of success is consequently not whether every firearms business receives every requested financial product. It is whether lawful manufacturers and retailers receive an individualized assessment based on demonstrable financial, operational, and legal risks—rather than exclusion because officials or bankers oppose the lawful products they sell. That is the standard the administration has announced; whether it becomes durable banking practice remains the central question.
Politics 2026
The Political Action Committees for the major anti-Second Amendment groups have increased their involvement in the 2026 mid-term elections. The Oct. 8 headline reads Everytown, House Majority PAC Launch Initial $10 Million Paid Media Campaign to Elect Moms Demand Action Volunteers ln the 2026 congressional elections Everytown is supporting 8 “Moms Demand Action Volunteers (all Democrats) with financial backing. A * by the candidate name = an incumbent. In all cases the NRA-PVF has rated the Everytown candidates with an F and their opponents with the exception on MI-08 with an A.
| State & District | Everytown Candidate | Opposing Republican Candidate |
| AZ-06 | JoAnna Mendoza (AZ-06) | Rep. Juan Coscomani * |
| FL-22 | Pia Dandiya (FL-22) | Casey Akar |
| IA-01 | Christina Bohannan (IA-01) | Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks * |
| IA-02 | Lindsay James (IA-02) | Joe Mitchell |
| IA-03 | Sarah Trone Garriott (IA-03) | Rep. Zaxh Nunn * |
| MI-08 | Rep. Kristen McDonald Rivet * (MI-08) | Tom Smith |
| MI-10 | Christina Hines (MI-10) | Michael Bourchard, Jr. |
| PA-08 | Mayor Paige Cognetti (PA-08) | Rep. Rob Breshahan, Jr. * |
