Fees, State-Approved Coursework, Then Permission to Buy: NRA Joins the Legal Fight Over Colorado’s Permit-to-Purchase Law for Semiautomatic Firearms

Estimated reading time: 3 minutes

DENVER, CO — The National Rifle Association has entered the litigation over Colorado’s permit-to-purchase requirement for semiautomatic firearms, according to an August 12 announcement from NRA-ILA headlined “NRA Joins Legal Fight Against Colorado’s Permit-to-Purchase Law for Semiautomatic Firearms.”

Gun Owners of America tracked the measure through the Colorado legislature as Senate Bill 25-003, and in a March 25, 2025 state alert GOA reported that the bill had cleared the Colorado House of Representatives the previous day by a vote of 36 to 2, and that because it had been amended repeatedly on its way through the House it had to go back to the Senate for a concurrence vote on those amendments. GOA described the bill as a semiautomatic firearms ban that “morphed into a permit-to-purchase FOID scheme.”

That morphing is the whole story of how these bills get sold. GOA characterized SB 25-003 as a nearly full semiautomatic firearms ban with a compliance door cut into it, and described the door this way: pay fees, take state-approved tests, and enter what GOA calls a registry. Under GOA’s account of the bill, a buyer either completes hunter safety education or holds a Colorado concealed handgun permit and then takes an additional four hours of coursework before entering the registry. A buyer with neither is looking at twelve hours of coursework first.

Strip away the acronyms and permit-to-purchase means one thing. The default answer is no. You do not walk in as a law-abiding adult, pass the background check, and walk out. You apply, you pay, you sit through state-approved instruction, you get entered into a state-held list, and then the state decides you may exercise a right you already had. Understand that I am about as pro-training as a person can be. Training is the entire point of a serious carry mindset, and I would rather every gun owner in America put in more hours than the law would ever ask of them. Training you choose is a discipline. Training the state converts into a gate you must pass before you may buy is something else, and calling it safety education does not change which one it is.

More from USA Carry:

• Michigan House Committee to Consider Repeal of Handgun Permit-to-Purchase and Registration
• Handgun Actions: The Pros and Cons of Each Type
• Third Circuit Strikes Down New Jersey’s Semiautomatic Rifle and 10-Round Magazine Bans as Unconstitutional
• Colorado Constitutional Carry Bill Advances
• Colorado Legislature Advances Semiautomatic Firearm Restrictions with SB25-003

SB 25-003 also did not travel alone. In that same alert, GOA flagged House Bill 25-1238, which it said would heavily restrict gun shows and gun show participants, and House Bill 25-1133, which it said would prohibit ammunition sales to anyone under 21, both of which GOA reported were still moving through the Senate at the time. I could not verify the final disposition of either measure from the sources available to me, so I am reporting only that GOA identified them as part of the same 2025 package.

I will continue tracking the challenge to Colorado’s permit-to-purchase law and will update this article once the court filings are available.