It looks like the ban has been lifted. Brass casing sold for domestic use will not require mutilation.

Georgia Arms have updated their website:

Dear Loyal Customers,

Thanks to your voice, DOD has rescinded the order to mutilate all spent cases as of 4:30 pm on 3/17/09. We appreciate the time and effort that you expended, together we all made a difference. We will be posting the email we received from DOD as well as any additional information within the next 12-16 hours. Thanks so much and lets get to work!!! Georgia Arms

This post on ar15.com is apparently by an employee of Government Liquidation:

Tromatic is actually pretty close with his assessment. The facts as I know them, which come directly from candid discussions with my CEO, indicate the following:

– Prior to 11/2008, Demil B items required no mutilation for sale to the public. That policy changed in November, but several exceptions were granted. Expended munitions brass was one of those given a waiver.
– Enter the new administration. Since Demil B category items had been given a broad, general label as “national security sensitive” someone above the DRMS (likely in the DLA) reviewed the policy and immediately went with a CYA policy and yanked all exemptions. No thoughts or considerations were given to the implications of this policy change, but this directive was issued to DOD Surplus effective immediately last week.
– Shit storm blows up as a result. In particular, the letters, phone calls, and emails to our legislators, the media, and anyone else who would listen caused this policy to be review post haste.
– As of this morning our company was informed that expended munitions brass will now be reclassified as Demil Q –– which requires no mutilation unless sold to a foreign country.

There you have it. The policy change was simply the result of some n00b administrator attempting to close a perceived “national security” loophole and brass got caught up in the snare. There was no political motivation behind the policy change, but it is good that people like us were suspicious, got involved, and helped bring about a resolution.

Ed

This email was sent by the Montana Shooting Sports Association:

Dear MSSA Friends,

I just received a phone call from the office of U.S. Senator Tester of Montana to inform me that at 5:15 (EST) today a letter cosigned by Senator Tester (D-MT) and Senator Baucus (D-MT) was faxed to the Department of Defense asking DoD to reverse its new policy requiring destruction of fired military cartridge brass. At 5:30, I am told, Tester’s office received a fax back from DoD saying that the brass destruction policy IS reversed.

Others report to me that they are already seeing evidence of this on the Websites of entities that liquidate surplus DoD commodities.

Our thanks go out to Senator Tester and Senator Baucus, and their staff, for getting on this problem promptly and making the reversal happen

Staff for Tester and Baucus promise they will get me the documentation for this reversal tomorrow morning. I’ll forward that when I get it.

Best wishes,

Gary Marbut, president
Montana Shooting Sports Association
http://www.mtssa.org
author, Gun Laws of Montana
http://www.mtpublish.com

It looks like you can breath easy now.

Thanks to Cannoneer for keeping me updated.