In 2024, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives revoked more gun store licenses than in any year over at least the past two decades, according to agency figures published on October 4. The numbers reflect a sustained and expanded crackdown on lawbreaking gun dealers since President Joe Biden imposed a zero tolerance policy three years ago.  

Investigators revoked 195 licenses in fiscal year 2024, up from last year’s record-setting total of 173. The number represents more than 2 percent of all licenses inspected, making it the highest rate of revocation since 2005.



The ramped up enforcement comes at a time of historic federal spending on gun violence prevention and a steady decline in homicides to pre-pandemic levels. Despite spasms of high-profile violence over the past year — including two assassination attempts on former President Donald Trump and a mass shooting at Apalachee High School in Winder, Georgia — gun violence has commanded little political attention ahead of November’s presidential election. 

Yet the Biden administration’s targeting of gun retailers could prove one of the more consequential gun violence prevention strategies of the past 20 years, according to experts.

“For many, many years law enforcement at the retailer level has been lax despite this being perhaps the best point of leverage to stop or slow gun crime,” said Topher McDougal, a University of San Diego economist who studies firearms trafficking. “I have to applaud the agency finally taking this responsibility seriously.”

ATF spokesperson Kristina Mastropasqua said the agency had revamped its inspections program and is now using an analytics tool to help steer resources toward inspecting gun dealers who pose a higher risk to public safety. She said the changes had “increased the effectiveness of compliance inspections” over the past three years. 

The ATF’s inspections division is responsible for ensuring that gun stores comply with federal firearms laws. Inspectors visit retailers to check whether they are maintaining required records and not selling guns illegally. When a check uncovers a violation, the inspector can recommend penalties ranging from written warnings to the revocation of a store’s license to sell guns.

In the past, the inspections division had assumed a more conciliatory posture toward gun dealers. A May 2021 investigation by The Trace and USA TODAY analyzed more than 2,000 inspections between 2015 and 2017 and found that the ATF had routinely let lawbreaking gun stores off the hook for serious violations that armed violent criminals and supplied gun trafficking networks. Investigators often recommended revoking licenses only to have their superiors downgrade the penalties to warnings, allowing repeat offenders to stay in business.

After the investigation, the Biden administration established a zero-tolerance policy for gun retailers who willfully violate any of five of the most serious federal firearms laws, including selling a gun without a background check and failing to keep accurate sales records.

The change led to a steep increase in revocations. As The Trace reported, the ATF revoked three times as many gun stores licenses in fiscal year 2022 over the previous year while inspecting a similar number of stores. Now, two years later, the number of gun stores inspected, the total number of licenses revoked, and the rate at which those licenses were revoked have all increased. For the first time since the pandemic significantly hobbled the agency’s ability to conduct inspections, the ATF inspected nearly 10,000 stores. 

“The baseline was low, the policies were well needed, and the result is to be expected: stronger enforcement,” said Joshua Scharff, general counsel and director of programs at the gun violence prevention group, Brady. “A stronger system is incredibly important to the public safety.”



Since the Biden administration announced the zero-tolerance policy, gun rights advocates, industry interest groups, and store owners have complained about the ATF revoking licenses for trivial infractions. The National Shooting Sports Foundation, the gun industry’s trade group, has repeatedly warned dealers that the ATF will revoke licenses for “minor clerical errors,” and congressional Republicans have written letters accusing the agency of unfairly prosecuting gun retailers.

Evidence for these claims has been sparse, but in 2023, the ATF began publishing inspection documents associated with revoked licenses to increase transparency around its decisions. 

The Trace reviewed ATF inspection records associated with 91 revocations in 2021 and 2022 — the only years released by the agency so far. The review showed that the majority of cases featured serious violations that clearly jeopardized public safety: Businesses had participated in gun trafficking schemes, refused investigators’ attempts at inspection, and repeatedly sold to prohibited purchasers.

However, in roughly 20 percent of cases, The Trace’s analysis showed supervisors of on-the-ground inspectors overruled recommendations for warnings and revoked the licenses instead. 

William Weber, a former ATF investigator who worked in the agency’s Houston field division between 2015 and November 2023, said that in his experience, the new policy stripped inspectors of discretion. “The on-site investigator that went to do the inspection no longer had the autonomy to decide whether something was willful or not,” he said, referencing the legal standard for revoking a license. “Businesses were no longer able to explain themselves before the notice of revocation was issued, but honest mistakes do happen.”

The Trace identified several cases where the gun store had no history of violations or of selling firearms later used in crimes. The ATF sometimes reopened investigations to revoke licenses from businesses that had already received warnings. In more than half the cases, supervisors explicitly cited the new zero-tolerance policy to justify enhancing the penalty.

Records indicate that the owners of an EZPawn pawn shop in Sheridan, Colorado, had their license revoked for willfully failing to conduct a background check during a gun sale.

Severin Schlyter, one of the shop’s former managers, told The Trace that a background check had been conducted, but an employee had accidentally written the incorrect reference number on federal forms. “It was unfair,” Schlyter said. “The current administration wanted to drop hammers, and they dropped a hammer.”

The ATF revoked the license of Capital City Arms in Cheyenne, Wyoming, for missing a document that confirmed a background check had been conducted for a sale, records show. It was the store’s first inspection.

In an interview with The Trace, the store’s owner, Army National Guardsman Andrew Wagnon, said that when the agency returned the packet of sales records inspectors had used to conduct their audit, he found the missing document, which showed he had conducted a background check. The agency had just skipped over it, he said. Wagnon shared this evidence with investigators, but they would not reverse the decision — he’d need to request an administrative review or apply for a new license.

“We were so turned off by the whole thing that my business partner and I just decided not to challenge it,” Wagnon said. “It was apparent to us that the ATF was using the tools at its disposal to meet an agenda. And while I don’t think it’s the intent of these laws to shut down gun stores for inconsequential clerical mistakes, the laws certainly allow the ATF to do that.”

Asked about these revocations, an ATF spokesperson said the agency is committed to enforcing policies fairly and in compliance with federal law. The zero tolerance policy did not alter the legal standards governing gun stores, and retailers dissatisfied with the agency’s determinations can challenge them in court. “Every licensee is granted procedural protections throughout the process — including the right to an administrative hearing and, if necessary, judicial review,” the spokesperson said.

The NSSF did not respond to a request for comment, but in April, the organization’s general counsel, Larry Keane, said in a press release that the “ATF’s focus on the firearm industry is diverting resources that should be applied to rounding up criminals, not running firearm retailers out of business for unintentional clerical errors.”

ATF field divisions, which oversee inspections in their respective regions, have implemented the zero-tolerance policy with differing results. In 2021 and 2022, only half of the divisions revoked licenses against the recommendations of on-site inspectors. Revocation rates also ranged widely. The 2024 data shows that Houston investigators revoked 0.4 percent of inspected licenses; in Washington, D.C., they revoked more than 13 percent.



The zero tolerance policy hangs in the balance as voters go to the polls in November. U.S. Senator and vice presidential candidate JD Vance has expressed support for abolishing the ATF, and Republicans in Congress have proposed legislation to drastically reduce the agency’s revocation power. 

The RIFLE Act, introduced by U.S. Representative Tracey Mann, a Kansas Republican, would prevent the ATF from enforcing penalties until retailers have received an opportunity to “demonstrate or achieve compliance.” The bill would also force the ATF to consider multiple instances of unlawful recordkeeping as a single violation and would bar the agency from using a dealer’s compliance history as evidence that they understood their legal requirements — a critical step in meeting the threshold for revocation.

The RIFLE Act has been referred to the House Committee on the Judiciary.