Republican Lawmaker Who Owns Gun Shop ‘Asked’ for Silencer Tax Breaks

Donald Trump’s tax bill, which Republicans passed in the House of Representatives overnight on Thursday, will slash funding for Medicaid, food assistance, and Medicare to finance a new set of tax cuts for the rich. It also includes tax breaks for gun silencers. 

In a speech at 4 a.m. on Thursday, as Republicans were pushing through their tax bill, Rep. Andrew Clyde (R-Ga.) took credit for the initial provision, which will eliminate a $200 excise tax on gun silencers. The lawmaker owns a gun shop worth millions of dollars.

“My Democrat colleagues have asked: How did this get in the bill, what was the deal, and who asked for it,” Clyde said. “No deal. I believe the speaker, with the purest of motive, simply wanted to restore a constitutional right.” Before his time ended, he added, “And who asked? Me. I asked.”

The lawmaker posted on X Thursday that he had quietly secured additional tax breaks on silencers. “The original bill text only removed the $200 transfer tax for suppressors. Now, the bill eliminates both the transfer and making tax for suppressors, as well as the registration,” Clyde wrote, calling it a “massive” Second Amendment victory. (These changes appear in the manager’s amendment that Republicans released late Wednesday and passed Thursday.)

Clyde owns a gun shop, Clyde Armory, in Athens, Georgia, and the building it is housed in — which could best be described as a gun castle. (Take a look.)

The store, which lists silencers for sale on its website, was previously placed under an enhanced federal monitoring program, according to The New York Times, after the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives “found that more than 25 guns sold there had been used in crimes within three years of their purchase.”

According to Clyde’s 2023 financial disclosure, the gun shop was worth between $5 million and $25 million. He valued the property as being worth between $1 million and $5 million. Clyde reported earning between $200,000 and $2 million in income in 2023 from the shop and property.

Everytown for Gun Safety, the anti-gun violence advocacy group, slammed Republicans’ silencer tax breaks in a statement Thursday. “There’s a reason silencers have been regulated for nearly a century: They make it much harder for law enforcement and bystanders to react quickly to gunshots,” said the organization’s president, John Feinblatt. “In the name of gun industry profits, House Republicans are putting law enforcement and our communities at greater risk of being shot — all while gutting health care for millions of Americans.”

Rep. Angie Craig (D-Minn.) was among the Democrats criticizing the silencer provision in recent days. “I have no idea why we think it’s a good idea to repeal a tax on silencers when we are going to feed fewer children in our country as a result of this. It’s a moral damn failure is what it is,” she said Wednesday.

Earlier this month, Clyde introduced legislation, called the “Constitutional Hearing Protection Act,” to deregulate and eliminate the excise tax on silencers.

“As an ardent defender of our Second Amendment liberties, I’m working to remove all infringements on our God-given right to keep and bear arms,” Clyde said in a press release at the time. “By deregulating suppressors, eliminating the costly $200 tax stamp on these firearms, and avoiding additional taxation, my legislation offers a constitutional solution to increase Americans’ access to suppressors.”

Clyde was one of four late conservative holdouts on the Trump tax bill who demanded that the legislation do more to cut Medicaid, the government health insurance program for low-income and disabled Americans. 

As a result of their efforts, the bill will phase in work Medicaid requirements sooner, by the end of 2026. That means the 10 million Americans who are expected to lose Medicaid coverage will lose their coverage sooner.

​​“We are not cutting Medicare or Medicaid,” Clyde said, falsely. “We want to strengthen Medicaid by saying to those who can work ‘all right, you need to work.’” 

The poor may not have health insurance or food assistance once Republicans pass this bill, but at least they won’t have to deal with the “draconian tax,” as Clyde put it Thursday morning, on gun silencers.