The North Texas-based maker of bump stocks, which allow semi-automatic weapons to fire like a machine gun, has announced it will shut down its website and stop taking orders for the devices next month.
The move by Slide Fire Solutions comes after the Justice Department proposed rule changes last month that will effectively ban the sale, manufacture or possession of bump stocks. No orders will be accepted after May 20, the company said in a notice on its website.
Slide Fire is located in Moran, Texas, about 130 miles west of Fort Worth.
A bump stock device was used by the gunman in the mass shooting at a Las Vegas music festival in October. The company was accused of negligence and design and manufacturing defects, according to Reuters.
Soon after the shooting, which claimed 58 lives, congressional leaders considered regulating or banning bump stocks. Even the National Rifle Association at the time said"devices designed to allow semi-automatic rifles to function like fully-automatic rifles should be subject to additional regulations."
President Trump called on the Justice Department to change its regulations and formally ban the devices in February, following the deadly high school shooting in Parkland, Florida.
Slide Fire, which was sued by a gun-control group, had temporarily stopped sales after the Las Vegas shooting, but later resumed.
Jeremiah Cottle, the founder of Slide Fire Solutions, invented the device and founded his company in Moran in 2010. The company is one of the small town’s leading employers.
