Firearms Manufacturers Refusing to Sell to States That Pass Strict Gun Laws

A number of firearms manufacturers and companies that sell firearms related products have joined a growing list of companies refusing to do business with states, counties, and other government agencies that pass new laws restricting citizens’ Second Amendment rights.

A list of some 34 of these companies has been posted at a website called The Police Loophole. The site informs visitors that the companies have publicly announced that they “will not sell items to states, counties, cities, and municipalities that restrict their citizens rights to own” the products they sell.

“There are some states, counties, cities, and municipalities in our great nation that fail to allow their citizens to fully exercise their right to keep and bear arms with restrictions such as magazine capacity or types of firearms that are widely available to citizens of other states, counties, cities, and municipalities. However, these government entities do not place these restrictions upon their own employees, such as police officers.”

The “police loophole” phrase is a take off on the so-called “gun show loophole” that gun control advocates use in order to push their anti-gun policies. One good “closed” loophole deserves another, as far as these website operators are concerned.

Several of the companies have thus far limited their ban on sales only to government agencies in New York State, but most have no specific locales for restrictions announced.

York Arms of Buxton, Maine, is typical of the move to refuse to sell to government agencies in New York. The company recently announced it won’t sell to any government agencies in the Empire State.

York Arms posted the following notice to its website: “Based on the recent legislation in New York, we are prohibited from selling rifles and receivers to residents of New York. We have chosen to extend that prohibition to all governmental agencies associated with or located within New York. As a result we have halted sales of rifles, short barreled rifles, short barreled shotguns, machine guns, and silencers to New York governmental agencies.”

he Maine-based York also cancelled all outstanding orders it had in the works with government agencies in New York.

One of the country’s largest mail-order merchants of firearms-related merchandise also announced a ban on sales to governments.

“Recently, companies such as LaRue Tactical and Olympic Arms have announced that they will no longer sell prohibited items to government agencies and personnel in states that deny the right to own those items to civilians. It has been and will continue to be Cheaper Than Dirt’s policy to not to sell prohibited items to government agencies and/or agents in states, counties, cities, and municipalities that have enacted restrictive gun control laws against their citizens. We support and encourage other companies that share in this policy.”

Other companies on the list include MidwayUSA, Smith Enterprises, Inc, Barret Arms, Norton Firearms, Tactical Solutions, and many more.

Yeah, I've been keeping up with this. While it sounds good and makes many people like me get a warm, fuzzy feeling, I don't see it lasting long. Companies in a capitalist society will not deny services to prospective clients for long IMO. Especially when we consider that government is trying to take away the largest of their client base.

It sounds like really bad business, but its their right to pick and choose what markets they want to sell their product in.

I'm surprised they didn't put California on the list. We have some very strict gun laws (some of which are good, however many are silly and divorced from any real problem), but we also have a huge gun owning, gun buying population. I challenge these businesses to put their money where their mouth is and quit selling to CA.