Complete Colorado reports that Colorado’s new semi-automatic firearm licensing law is drawing backlash after the Department of Revenue released guidance identifying roughly 900 firearm makes and models subject to regulation under Senate Bill 25-003. The guidance spans 152 pages and includes a broad range of firearms, from AR and AK platform rifles to common handguns like Glocks, rimfire rifles like the Ruger 10/22, and even some firearms critics say are not semi-automatic at all.
The law, passed by Democrats in 2025, requires Coloradans seeking to purchase regulated semi-automatic firearms to complete a 12-hour in-person course through their local sheriff’s office, undergo a background check, pay fees, pass a final exam with a 90% score, and have their personal information uploaded into a state course-record system granting five years of eligibility. The Department of Revenue says the regulated-firearms list may continue expanding over time. Gun-rights groups, including the Colorado State Shooting Association, are now challenging the law in court through Del Toro v. Polis.
The Bullet Point Brief
- Colorado did not technically ban these firearms. It just built a toll booth in front of them and handed the Department of Revenue the clipboard.
- The state’s guidance reportedly covers around 900 makes and models, including firearms many lawmakers and activists previously implied would remain untouched. Bureaucracy has a funny habit of expanding once it smells authority.
- To exercise what many Coloradans view as a constitutional right, citizens must now complete a 12-hour class, pass an exam, pay fees, submit personal information, and enter a government tracking system. Apparently “shall not be infringed” now comes with office hours and paperwork.
- Critics argue the law sweeps far beyond what supporters publicly sold during debate, including firearms commonly used for hunting, sport shooting, and personal defense. The Department of Revenue says the list may continue evolving over time, because naturally the bureaucracy comes with software updates.
- Legal challenges are already underway under Bruen and the Second Amendment. Colorado’s modern legislative model increasingly seems to be: pass sweeping law first, litigate constitutionality later, invoice taxpayers throughout.
My Bottom Line
This is what happens when government stops treating rights like rights and starts treating them like regulated privileges.
Colorado has now wandered into a place where law-abiding citizens must effectively ask permission before purchasing constitutionally protected firearms, all while the state insists this is merely “public safety.” No, it is bureaucracy dressed in a safety vest.
And let’s be honest about the absurdity here. The same political crowd that treats voter ID requirements like an assault on democracy suddenly becomes deeply enthusiastic about government permission slips when the constitutional right in question makes them uncomfortable. Apparently showing ID to vote is oppression, but mandatory classes, fees, databases, exams, and state eligibility systems before purchasing a firearm is enlightened governance. Fascinating ideological flexibility.
The real target here does not appear to be crime. Criminals are not exactly famous for carefully complying with Department of Revenue guidance documents. The target is the regulatory machine itself: politicians who pass sprawling gun laws, agencies forced to interpret the mess afterward, and activists who seem to believe constitutional limits are more decorative than binding.
Now, to be clear, not every firearm on that list is identical. Different firearms serve different purposes, and pretending otherwise is intellectually lazy. But that is almost beside the point. The deeper issue is civic and constitutional: if the government can require licensing schemes before citizens exercise a constitutional right, then the government is no longer treating that right as fundamental. It is treating it as conditional.
That is why the legal pushback matters.
Bruen did not suggest governments get unlimited authority to wrap constitutional rights in layers of administrative procedure until ordinary citizens give up from exhaustion. Yet Colorado increasingly legislates as though constitutional scrutiny is merely an annoying afterthought handled later by attorneys and taxpayers.
And that seems to be the pattern now: legislate first, litigate later, and let the courts sort out whether the Constitution still means what it says.
Meanwhile, ordinary Coloradans get buried under forms, fees, classes, databases, and bureaucratic ambiguity while politicians congratulate themselves for “doing something.” Denver did not ban the guns outright. It just built a toll booth in front of them and called the delay progress.
Source: Complete Colorado
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