Why It Matters: Colorado SB25-003 (SB3) many semi-automatic rifles and shotguns commonly used by America’s sportsmen and women in hunting and recreational shooting. However, after multiple rounds of amendments, SB3 now seeks to impose new permitting requirements for gun owners. Modern sporting rifles and semi-automatic shotguns are not only important to our hunting heritage but are highly popular in the recreational shooting community which is widely credited as the source of roughly 80% of conservation funding generated through the Pittman-Robertson Act. This legislation would severely undermine our hunting heritage, firearm rights, and would negatively impact the American System of Conservation Funding.
Highlights:
- In its original form, SB3 would have outright banned the manufacture, distribution, transfer or sale of semiautomatic firearms that accept a detachable magazine. Current owners of these firearms would have been grandfathered in, but future transfers would only have been allowed to direct heirs, someone outside of Colorado, or to an FFL.
- Following several rounds of amendments in the Senate, SB3 has been softened to now allow people to continue to purchase and own the affected firearms following participation in a firearms safety training program and a test.
- SB3 is now waiting for a hearing in the House Judiciary Committee, where it will likely have an easier time than the Senate.
As reported previously, the anti-gun members of the Colorado Legislature kicked off the 2025 legislative session with yet another gun ban bill, SB-25-003. As originally introduced, SB3 would have effectively banned all semi-automatic firearms that accept a detachable magazine, which in turn would have had a massive impact on sportsmen and recreational shooters throughout the Centennial State.
However, following intense behind-the-scenes pressure on legislators from sporting-conservation groups like the Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation (CSF), firearms advocacy groups like our partners at the National Rifle Association and National Shooting Sports Foundation, and tremendous participation in the public testimony process by scores of Coloradans, senators were convinced to change SB3 significantly. Before leaving the upper chamber, SB3 received several amendments in the Senate Judiciary Committee.
SB3 is by no means good legislation now, however, it is certainly less onerous. The main change is that now, rather than outrightly banning semi-automatic firearms that receive detachable magazines, Coloradans may still buy and own these common types of firearms just as before. However, to do so, should SB3 pass, Colorado residents will have to pass either a hunter safety course AND a new firearms safety course to be managed by Colorado Parks and Wildlife (CPW), OR take a yet undefined 12-hour firearms safety course. Both paths will naturally include more fees, more fingerprints, and yet more unnecessary background checks on top of the ones already required when purchasing firearms from an FFL.
The passage of SB3 will likely have a cooling effect on participation in the hunting and shootings sports, which in turn will have a negative impact on conservation funding and scientific wildlife management in Colorado. Last year, nearly $90 million in revenue was raised for Colorado Parks and Wildlife from hunting licenses alone, and the 2024 distribution of the Pittman-Robertson funds will likely exceed the $24 million distributed to Colorado in 2023. Any prohibition on the possession, transfer, and sale of some of the most commonly used firearms will depress participation in hunting and recreational shooting, and eliminate a large portion of the contributions to the Pittman-Robertson fund, together resulting in millions in lost revenue for Colorado Parks and Wildlife.
The financial impact doesn’t stop there, however. Colorado is facing at least a $1.2 Billion budget shortfall this year, and growing. Given that this new version of SB3 will increase the manpower and financial burden on CPW and local law enforcement by requiring CPW to create and administer a new gun safety program, and force sheriff’s departments to perform more background checks and fingerprinting, Senate Republicans requested a fiscal note from Colorado Legislative Council. The fiscal note estimates that, if passed, in 2025 to 2026 alone SB3 would require $550,000 to the Department of Natural Resources from the Wildlife Cash Fund, $1,612,101 to the Department of Public Safety from the CBI Identification Unit Cash Fund, and a $4,655,352 appropriation from the General Fund for the Department of Public Safety.
Colorado literally cannot afford the passage of SB3, not to mention the untold cost the Colorado Attorney General’s office will lay on taxpayers while defending the questionable constitutionality of the bill over the next several years. The Congressional Sportsmen’s Foundation has opposed legislation like SB3 in Colorado and elsewhere, and we will continue to do so.
As always, we will keep you up to date on the latest. Stay tuned!
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