The anti-civil rights bills are flooding in and both gun owners and the firearms industry are facing unprecedented attacks in Virginia.
For a complete list of all bills impacting gun owners and the firearms industry and what their current status is, please see the Bill Tracker I maintain for the Virginia Citizens Defense League (VCDL) and sign up for the VA-ALERT email updates.
HB21 purports to impose ‘Standards of Responsible Conduct’ upon the firearms industry in Virginia. But a detailed read of the proposed bill shows that its ultimate impact will be to discourage new businesses from opening in Virginia, encourage existing industry members to flee the state, and to avoid serving those segments of the population deemed ‘high-risk’.
In short, this bill will have a chilling effect on an industry that serves to facilitate a fundamental right, the right to possess firearms for defense of self and home. It will even further impact the ability of those that live in poverty or high-crime areas since industry members are held to a nebulous standard of determining whether a given buyer is a ‘high-risk’ purchaser.
And all of these requirements are hazy at best, imposing potential criminal and civil liability that could bankrupt any industry member on a given day. It isn’t difficult to surmise that the real goal of the bill is not to serve the public but to have a chilling effect on the underlying 2nd Amendment rights of the customers served by the industry.
See the infographic below for a broad picture of what industry members will be facing if this bill is passed into law.
We now have what may be the final language for SB749, the ban on modern sporting rifles (or so-called ‘Assault Weapons‘ using the made-up term from the bill).
If signed in its current form, after July 1, 2026 it will impact the ability of law-abiding Virginians to acquire the most commonly owned firearms in America in direct violation of the 2nd Amendment as laid out in Bruen.
Without a specific exemption for NFA items, it also impacts the ability of Virginians to acquire certain NFA items such as machineguns and Short-Barreled Rifles and Shotguns.
For a detailed analysis of whether a given firearm is considered an ‘assault weapon’ under SB749, I have prepared a detailed flowchart.
As for what will and will not be allowed, I have an infographic below that lays out the broad strokes.
I will keep this post updated if there are changes or when the bill is signed.
In the meantime, it appears that documentation of pre-ban ownership will become much more important when this goes into effect. I can help with this.
You should consider acquiring any NFA items such as SBRs that will be impacted now as well as moving your non-NFA items into a trust to accomplish this. My trusts are a flat fee of $100 and come with lifetime free changes and updates.
As of the latest January 2026 updates, eForms now allows Form 4 transfers in addition to those that are initiated by a sale at an FFL. These transfers include:
This means the paper process is largely a thing of the past. Couple this with the removal of the federal tax stamp and there couldn’t be a better time to start a trust and move your individually owned items into the trust.
If you wish, I can assist with submitting one or more eForm 4s for you. Prior to calling me to schedule a time, you will need to do the following:
Checklist Items
The following instructions go into greater detail about each of these steps.
Email me a Scanned Copy of All 17 Pages of Your Notarized Trust
This will include the 13 pages of the body of the trust, which ends with the notarized signature on page 13, AND each of the four schedules that you have signed and dated. It will be 17 pages in total.
Email me a Scanned Copy of Any Trust Amendments
You probably do NOT have any amendments. But if I have created any for you then send me a notarized copy of each.
Have Each Responsible Person on the Trust Complete a Form 23
Please see these detailed instructions for completing the Form 23.
This guide will walk you through every step of the process to do a private transfer of individually owned or trust owned NFA items to your NFA Trust and make it as easy as possible. The fields referenced are based upon the December 2025 revision of the Form 4. As new revisions of the form are released, I will update this guide.
Getting Started
The Form 4 is available for download from the ATF website. You should save it to your computer and open it with Adobe Reader or your preferred PDF editor on your computer (rather than editing it in your browser or on a phone or tablet where the built in automations will NOT work correctly) then it will auto-copy the data you type into the ‘ATF Copy’ to the ‘Registrant Copy’ and the ‘CLEO Copy’.
Form 4 – Page 1
Form 4 – Page 2
Form 4 – Page 3
Turning to the Form 23
A copy of the new ‘responsible person’ form 5320.23 (Form 23) will need to be completed by each ‘responsible person’ of the trust listed in Box 21 of the Form 4.
Important Note: Your fellow ‘responsible persons’ will find it much easier to complete this form if they have a copy of the completed Form 4 in front of them.
The Form 23 may be downloaded from the ATF website. It is well designed with fillable fields which auto-transfer the data to additional copies (this only works if you use a PDF editor on your computer instead of on your browser, phone, or tablet). I will instruct you where to send each copy later in this guide.
You, and any Joint Trustees listed on Schedule B of your trust, should download the form and each one must complete it according to the following instructions:
Form 23 – Page 1
Form 23 – Page 2
Printing The Completed Form 23
Once you have completed the Form 23, you will need to print it. It will print 2 copies. You should now affix your photo to the ATF copy of the Form 23 only. (DO NOT USE STAPLES)
Signing the Completed Form 23
The only place you will need to sign the Form 23 is following the certification statement below Box 9. You do NOT add “as trustee” to your signature on this form.
Do not forget to sign both copies of the Form 23.
Important: The ATF requires all signatures to be in either blue or black ink.
Notifying Your CLEO
The Settlor of the trust will need to mail his or her CLEO (From Box 5 of the Form 23) the CLEO copy of the Form 4 and the CLEO copy of their Form 23.
All other responsible persons (in the rare event you have them) will only need to mail his or her CLEO (From Box 5 of their Form 23) the CLEO copy of their Form 23.
Important Note: The CLEO copy of the Form 23 does not have a photo affixed. You should also not send fingerprint cards to the CLEO.
Fingerprint Cards
Each Form 23 to be sent to the ATF will need to be accompanied by fingerprints of the responsible person taken on TWO FBI (FD-258) fingerprint cards. As I noted here, many NFA dealers offer in-store fingerprinting so you should check with your local gun store. Failing that, you should be able to get fingerprinted at your local law enforcement agency. No matter who does the fingerprinting, you should make sure that they use the correct FD-258 cards.
Mailing the Completed Form 4 Packet to the ATF
Now we need to prepare the packet to mail to the ATF. Note that If you are building more than one NFA item, you will need a separate packet for each item.
This packet should include:
The entire packet should be mailed to:
National Firearms Act Division
Bureau of ATF
PO Box 5015
Portland, OR 97208-5015
If this guide leaves any questions unanswered, please feel free to contact me.
