The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) has reached a settlement agreement with the Contra Costa County Sheriff’s Office over policies that previously prohibited permit holders from carrying handguns equipped with red dot sights or flashlights and an outright ban on the carry of single action only 1911- and 2011-style pistols.

Under the agreement, the Sheriff’s Office will withdraw its prohibitions on red-dot sights, weapon-mounted lights and semiautomatic single-action 1911 and 2011 platform pistols carried under a county CCW license. The office will update its concealed-carry website within 10 days to reflect the change. SAF was joined in SAF v. Contra Costa County by private citizens Andrew Moore and James Treuel who were represented by John W. Dillon of the Dillon Law Group.

“A sheriff does not get to invent a shorter list of approved handguns and accessories than the Constitution allows,” said SAF Director of Legal Research and Education and attorney of record in the case Kostas Moros. “Even though red-dot sights, weapon lights and 1911 and 2011 pistols are in common use for lawful self-defense, Contra Costa treated them as contraband. This settlement ends that unlawful practice, and we are pleased the County saw the error if its ways and resolved these issues.”

Concealed carry license applicants in Contra Costa County remain subject to the usual range-qualification requirements for any firearm they intend to list on a license. Existing licensees who add a red-dot sight or weapon-mounted light to a listed firearm may also be required to present the firearm for inspection and to qualify with the added accessory. Listed firearms must otherwise comply with applicable law.

“Given SAF has more than a dozen lawsuits in California alone, it should come as no surprise that it took legal action to restore the right to keep and bear arms of citizens in Contra Costa County,” said SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. Read more

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced today that it filed a motion for preliminary injunction in Hoffman v. City and County of Denver, asking the federal court to immediately block enforcement of the Colorado and Denver gun carry ban regime as to Plaintiff Gene Hoffman and similarly situated peaceable nonresidents, and require Colorado to allow them to obtain carry licenses on the same terms as Colorado residents.

The State of Colorado generally requires a permit to carry a concealed handgun but refuses to issue those permits to nonresidents. Instead, the State recognizes permits from another state only when that state recognizes Colorado permits. Denver separately bans open carry, so peaceable people from outside those states can be left with no lawful way to carry a handgun at all while in Denver. And because federal law generally prohibits firearm possession within 1,000 feet of a school unless the person has a license issued by the state where the school is located, Colorado’s refusal to issue permits to nonresidents creates a massive labyrinth of prohibited areas throughout the State where affected travelers can be effectively disarmed—or risk federal prosecution and imprisonment simply for carrying a firearm. Colorado law also reserves certain carry privileges in public university and government-building parking areas for permit holders.

“Colorado and Denver cannot turn their borders into a police-state checkpoint where peaceable people are forced to surrender their rights. The right to bear arms throughout the United States belongs to the People—not only Colorado residents. Colorado and Denver have created an insane regime that completely disarms peaceable Americans simply because they live somewhere else, and we’re asking the court to put an end to it now. FPC and our Grassroots Army will continue to Fight Forward and eliminate all of these unconstitutional and immoral residency-based bans,” said FPC President Brandon Combs.

FPC’s motion argues that the case should be straightforward under the Supreme Court’s binding precedents—the Second Amendment protects the People’s right to carry firearms in public for self-defense, and that protection does not disappear when someone crosses a state line. As the filing explains, “the Second Amendment, like every guarantee in the Bill of Rights, ‘has the same meaning in all parts of the United States.'”

The historical record makes Colorado’s position even worse. Far from supporting residency-based disarmament, early American laws often gave travelers more protection to carry arms, not less. The motion identifies colonial laws requiring people traveling away from home to carry arms and later laws expressly exempting travelers from carry restrictions. The motion also argues that Colorado’s discrimination against nonresidents violates the Constitution’s Privileges and Immunities Clause, which protects Americans from being denied fundamental privileges simply because they come from another state. Read more

The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) joined the National Rifle Association in filing an amicus brief with the U.S. Supreme Court in Johnson v. United States, urging the Court to review the Tenth Circuit’s decision upholding a lifetime federal firearms ban for nonviolent felons.

Joseph Frederick Johnson is challenging 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) as applied to a peaceable person. The Tenth Circuit treated Heller’s reference to “presumptively lawful” felon prohibitions as conclusive and foreclosed an as-applied challenge. The brief argues that Bruen and Rahimi require every arms regulation – including those Heller called “presumptively lawful” – to be justified by historical tradition. That tradition supports disarming only dangerous persons, not everyone whose offense happens to be classified as a felony.

“Heller’s ‘presumptively lawful’ line was never a blank check for a lifetime ban on every peaceable American with a felony on his record,” said SAF Director of Legal Research and Education Kostas Moros. “Historically, we disarmed dangerous people. We did not strip the Second Amendment right from those who broke the law without violence and then went back to living as ordinary, peaceable citizens. A permanent ban with no path to restoration is simply not how our tradition worked.”

Colonial and Founding-era restrictions targeted people thought to pose a threat: wartime enemies, rebels and those with a proven proclivity for violence. Ratifying conventions spoke of “peaceable citizens” and of disarmament only for those “in actual rebellion” or who presented “real danger of public injury.” After Shays’s Rebellion, Massachusetts required rebels to surrender arms and then allowed them to reclaim those arms within months. Militia laws required able-bodied men to keep arms and contained no exemption for prior nonviolent convictions. Some statutes even expressly protected criminals’ arms from seizure for debt.

“A conviction for a nonviolent offense should not automatically require a lifetime forfeiture of a person’s right to keep and bear arms,” said SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. “The historical tradition as applied here requires only those who are deemed “dangerous” be disarmed. A nonviolent felony mistake should not require a lifetime ban on exercising someone’s Second Amendment rights. We encourage the Court to grant this petition and make clear that § 922(g)(1) cannot be applied to peaceable people the historical tradition never disarmed.” Read more

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced that it filed a new federal lawsuit challenging Colorado and Denver laws that combine to deny peaceable residents of 15 states and the District of Columbia any lawful means to carry a handgun for self-defense while in Denver. The complaint for Hoffman v. City and County of Denver can be viewed here.

The lawsuit was filed on behalf of FPC and FPC member Gene Hoffman, a California resident. Hoffman regularly travels to Denver, is legally eligible to possess firearms, holds a carry permit, and would carry a handgun for lawful self-defense there but for the challenged laws.

Colorado generally limits its concealed handgun permits to state residents and recognizes out-of-state permits only when the holder is a resident of a state that recognizes Colorado permits. And while Colorado generally allows open carry, Denver prohibits it. Together, those laws leave otherwise-qualified residents of states without Colorado reciprocity unable to carry either openly or concealed while in Denver.

The complaint asks the court to declare the combined Colorado and Denver restrictions unconstitutional and require defendants to provide FPC members and the individual plaintiffs a lawful means to carry. The requested relief does not prescribe a single mechanism: the complaint identifies options including allowing open carry, issuing nonresident permits, recognizing out-of-state permits, or providing an equally effective means.

“Colorado and Denver cannot deny millions of Americans their right to carry. As we’ve successfully shown in other cases, fundamental rights do not stop at state lines. Read more

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced today that it filed its reply brief in support of a preliminary injunction in Bathras v. Moore, urging the United States District Court for the District of Maryland to block the State’s new ban on Glock and Glock-style handguns before it takes effect. Individuals who want to join the FPC Grassroots Army and help support important lawsuits like this one can sign up in under three minutes at JoinFPC.org.

Maryland’s new law prohibits the manufacture, sale, purchase, receipt, or transfer of so-called “machine gun convertible pistols” beginning January 1, 2027. The State acknowledges that the law targets ordinary semiautomatic handguns because criminals can illegally modify them using illegal conversion devices. FPC’s reply argues that this turns the Second Amendment on its head: the government cannot ban common, constitutionally protected arms because someone could later criminally alter or misuse them.

“Maryland is trying to impose a tyrannical ban on some of the most popular handguns in America, full stop. Glocks are constitutionally protected arms and Maryland can show no historical tradition that justifies banning them. We will Fight Forward until this immoral scheme is eliminated,” said FPC President Brandon Combs.

The reply explains that Glock-style handguns are indisputably common arms used for lawful purposes, and that Maryland does not identify any historical tradition of banning an otherwise lawful firearm merely because criminals could illegally convert, misuse, or abuse it. Read more

BELLEVUE, Wash. — The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) secured a major win today in Harrington v. Crawford after school district officials admitted the search of plaintiff Jack Harrington’s vehicle violated his Fourth Amendment rights.

In October last year, SAF filed the case after Harrington’s vehicle was searched on Hillsboro-Deering High School grounds solely on the basis of school officials learning that Harrington lawfully owned a firearm in his personal life. Harrington owns a handgun which he sometimes carries with him in his truck – in full compliance with all federal and New Hampshire state laws – but never brought the gun to school, which he knew was prohibited. Upon learning that Harrington lawfully owned a firearm, however, he was subjected to interrogation and his vehicle being searched without his consent. No firearm was found during the illegal search as it was safely stored at his home, nowhere near the school campus.

“Maintaining safety on school grounds is a laudable goal,” said SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. “But the Constitution demands that school officials have, at minimum, reasonable suspicion to search a student’s property. Critically, choosing to exercise one’s Second Amendment rights cannot be interpreted as a waiver of your rights under the Fourth Amendment, nor can it create reasonable suspicion of a crime. We’re pleased the school district here has admitted their errors and reinforced that the fundamental rights of their students will be respected.”

As noted in the original complaint, “…after the Interrogation in which Jack repeatedly refused to consent to a search and after Jack’s parents were contacted by phone and similarly refused to consent to a search, Defendants searched the Subject Vehicle anyway, finding no firearm.”

“Publicly acknowledging that you’re a gun owner does not justify endless harassment or subject you to invasive searches,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “The overwhelming majority of gun owners are law-abiding peaceable people for their entire lives. Simply choosing to exercise your rights under the Second Amendment does not imply that you may do something criminal with a firearm and does not create reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed. If that were the case, then lawful gun owners like Mr. Harrington would not just be subject to search of their property on one day – but every day – unless and until they prove that they have sold their constitutionally protected property to the satisfaction of school officials. The Constitution prevents precisely that outcome and worked exactly as designed in this case.” Read more

Court reverses lower court, renders judgment for FPC, and holds federal handgun purchase restrictions unconstitutional under the Second Amendment

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced today a major victory in Elite Precision Customs v. ATF, with the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit holding that the federal government’s ban on direct interstate handgun purchases violates the Second Amendment. The Court reversed the lower court’s dismissal of the case and rendered judgment for FPC and its co-plaintiffs.

Individuals who want to join the FPC Grassroots Army and help support important lawsuits like this one can sign up in under three minutes at JoinFPC.org.

The federal laws challenged by FPC categorically prohibit people from directly purchasing handguns from licensed dealers outside their state of residence. While federal law provides exceptions for interstate rifle and shotgun purchases, handgun buyers are instead forced to arrange an additional transfer through a licensed dealer in their home state—a process that depends on another dealer agreeing to participate and typically imposes additional fees and delays.

The Fifth Circuit’s conclusion was unequivocal: “The Ban sullies the plain text of the Second Amendment and is inconsistent with the nation’s tradition of firearms regulation.” The Court reversed the district court and rendered judgment for FPC and the other plaintiffs. Read more

The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and its partners have filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the U.S. Supreme Court seeking review in Christian v. James, a case challenging New York’s sweeping “sensitive places” firearms carry ban.

SAF has already secured two victories in the case, with the federal district court ruling that New York’s prohibition of concealed carry on private property open to the public is unconstitutional – a ruling later conceptually reaffirmed when the Supreme Court struck down a near-identical Hawaii state law in Wolford v. Lopez. In May, the Second Circuit affirmed that ruling as it relates to carry on private property open to the public. In the same ruling, however, the Second Circuit upheld the constitutionality of New York’s carry ban in public parks. That ruling lead to today’s petition asking the Supreme Court to review the case.

“For the same reasons both the Supreme Court and Second Circuit struck down major portions of this law already, the remaining ban on permitted carry in public parks should meet the same fate,” said SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut. “This firearm carry ban applies to every public park across New York, from Central Park in Manhattan to remote state forests and recreational areas. New York has beautiful outdoor spaces and those who enjoy those scenic landscapes should not be forced to be vulnerable and unable to protect their families. We learned in the Supreme Court’s Wolford decision that the Second Amendment protects the ability of peaceable Americans to carry as they go about their daily lives. For many New Yorkers, taking advantage of the beautiful public parks is part of their daily lives. As the Court continues to explain precisely what types of public spaces can be deemed ‘sensitive’ we are hopeful that it takes this opportunity to hold that public parks are not among them.”

As stated in the petition, “Only (the Supreme Court) can resolve whether the Second Amendment’s promise will apply to all Americans guaranteed the fundamental right it protects.” SAF is joined in the case by the Firearms Policy Coalition and Brett Christian, for whom the case is named.

“If there’s ever a time when a citizen should be allowed to carry a firearm for self-defense, it’s in the wilds of New York,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. Read more

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced today that it and its co-plaintiffs filed a motion for summary judgment in Struck v. Davenport, asking the United States District Court for the District of New Jersey to declare the State’s “one-gun-a-month” handgun purchase ban unconstitutional and permanently enjoin its enforcement. This move comes after FPC was successful in striking down California’s similar law—the first time the Ninth Circuit issued a final judgment striking down a law as unconstitutional under the Second Amendment.

FPC’s motion argues that the case is straightforward under the Supreme Court’s Second Amendment precedents. The constitutional text protects the right to “keep and bear Arms,” and courts across the country have recognized that the right necessarily protects the ability to acquire firearms. Because the plaintiffs seek to acquire handguns for lawful purposes, the motion argues that their conduct is presumptively protected and New Jersey bears the burden of proving that its restriction is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.

The FPC motion also points to FPC’s landmark victory in Nguyen v. Bonta, where the Ninth Circuit struck down California’s substantially similar one-gun-a-month restriction. Read more