Sponsors
The bill standardizes and protects the use of merchant category codes for firearm sellers—simplifying payments and enabling consistent data use—while preempting state controls and raising privacy and compliance concerns for consumers, states, and businesses.
Consumers and firearm retailers: standardized merchant category codes (MCCs) for firearm merchants will be protected from state-level blocking, creating consistent classification across payment systems and reducing transaction friction for sellers and buyers.
Payment processors and banks: the bill preempts divergent state bans on MCC usage, reducing state-by-state regulatory complexity and compliance burdens for multi-state payment firms.
Law enforcement and regulators: uniform transaction coding for firearm merchants can enable more consistent reporting or monitoring across jurisdictions if agencies choose to use MCC data.
State governments: the bill removes state authority to restrict merchant coding practices intended to reduce firearm-related sales or track transactions, limiting local policy options.
Cardholders: mandatory or standardized MCC usage makes firearm purchases easier to identify in payment records, raising privacy and surveillance concerns for consumers.
Financial institutions and merchants: coding firearm transactions could increase compliance costs, legal exposure, or risk of new obligations or lawsuits tied to how those transactions are handled.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Prohibits States from banning or discouraging the use of any ISO merchant category code (MCC) that identifies firearm merchants or payment-card transactions for firearms, ammunition, ammunition components, or firearm accessories. Gives the U.S. Attorney General authority to bring a civil action in federal court to enforce the prohibition.
Introduced January 16, 2026 by Maxwell Frost · Last progress January 16, 2026