Category: Anti Civil Rights ideas & “Friends”
Albany, NY (WRGB) — A recently passed New York state law that bars licensed firearms owners to carry concealed on all private property is unconstitutional, according to a federal judge.
The ruling down Thursday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of New York follows a decision in December by the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
The law makes it a felony for a concealed-carry license holder to carry their firearm on all private property — unless the property owner expressly allows it. District Court Judge John Sinatra Jr. writes that the state can’t enforce this rule on private property that is open to the public.
Regulation in this area is permissible only if the government demonstrates that the new enactment is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of sufficiently analogous regulations. New York fails that test here. Indeed, property owners have the right to exclude. But the state may not unilaterally exercise that right and, thereby, interfere with the long-established Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens who seek to carry for self-defense on private property open to the public.
New York state cannot enforce this part of the law, which also includes a ban on concealed-carry in “sensitive places,” such as government property, religious institutions, healthcare facilities, parks, libraries, places serving alcohol, and others. The Court of Appeals in December upheld the sensitive locations clause but deferred other provisions back to lower courts.
“My office will continue to defend New York’s gun laws and use every tool to protect New Yorkers from senseless gun violence,” Attorney General Letitia James said in December.
Rep. Elise Stefanik applauded Thursday’s ruling.
Despite Kathy Hochul and radical New York Democrats repeated attempts to target law-abiding New York gun owners, today’s ruling from the Western District of New York delivers a win for New Yorkers’ Second Amendment rights, striking down Kathy Hochul’s unconstitutional overreach by simply applying recent common sense rulings of the United States Supreme Court. When it comes to the Second Amendment, Kathy Hochul and New York Democrats refuse to follow the Constitution. I applaud today’s ruling and will always fight for the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding New Yorkers.
The U.S. Supreme Court struck down a century-old rule in a 2022 ruling, making it easier for New York gun owners to apply for and obtain a concealed carry license. Since 1913, New York state law required anyone seeking a concealed-carry license to show “proper cause,” or justification, to carry.
Gov. Kathy Hochul called state lawmakers back to Albany days after the ruling and within a month of the legislative session ending, to strengthen existing gun laws in response to the Supreme Court ruling.
A recent spate of gun confiscation in New Zealand shows just how dangerous a gun registry can be when combined with some gun owners opposing the views of those in charge of the government. And with constant attempts to create a registry in the United States, it highlights a danger Americans should understand.
According to a report at waikatotimes.co.nz, 62 firearms license holders recently had their licenses revoked, forcing them to surrender their guns to the government or another firearms license holder. The individuals were all members of the group Sovereign Citizens, or SovCits, who hold that the federal government there is illegitimate.
New Zealand authorities conducted Operation Belfast in 2022 in an attempt to identify safety risks for law enforcements. The focus was SovCits, and authorities identified some 1,400 people they believed subscribed to the group’s ideology. Of that group, 58 were firearms license holders.
One of the conditions of retaining a firearm license in New Zealand, under the country’s Arms Act, is that license holders meet the obligation of being a “fit and proper person” to hold a license. Having an undefinable condition like that within the country’s gun laws gives the government overwhelming power to deem anyone they choose to not be “fit and proper” and make them relinquish their guns.
According to the report, an intelligent report from 2021 “found that there was a ‘realistic possibility’ that a violent extremist or group of violent extremists, motivated by SovCit beliefs, would commit a spontaneous act of violence in response to a perceived assault by government agencies during a routine act of legal or regulatory enforcement.’” However, to date the perceived “threat” hasn’t resulted in any violence with firearms.
Over the years, the New Zealand government has repeatedly tightened its gun laws, most recently in 2020 with firearms registry that required license holders to update as they buy or sell guns.
“The new law is designed to stop firearms falling into the wrong hands,” Minister of Police Stuart Nash said at the time. “It spells out for the first time that owning a firearm is a privilege, limited to responsible licensed owners.”
The move prompted the International Bar Association to tout the country as a model for what American politicians should do to address criminal violence.
“The Pacific nation has introduced swift and sweeping reforms of gun laws following the mass shooting in Christchurch in March—a move that highlights the continuing lack of action to tackle gun violence in the United States,” the IBA stated in a news item following the passage for further restrictions.
Interestingly, the Sovereign Citizens movement is alive and well in the United States. In a nutshell, adherents believe the government is the illegitimate product of a conspiracy that subverted the original, lawful government. And they believe people can take steps to divorce themselves from the illegitimate government, after which it has no authority or jurisdiction over them.
If, in fact, we had a national gun registry or national firearms licensing in the U.S., it’s not a large step to think that the Biden-Harris administration or future administrations might go after their firearms by deeming them a threat to law enforcement or simply because their ideology wasn’t in line with the people in power.
Michigan and Hawaii, both Democrat-led states, have launched taxpayer-funded tip lines for individuals looking to report perceived firearms violations anonymously. While these dumpster fire states claim the lines are aimed at lawbreakers, Second Amendment groups are reasonably skeptical, as they should be, because such a system can easily be abused. Let’s face it, we know that the weaponization of this service against law-abiding gun owners is exactly what they are intended for.
On Thursday, October 10, Hawaii’s Democrat Governor Josh Green announced the state’s Department of Law Enforcement had established a confidential “Gun Tip Line for people to make anonymous reports of illegal gun ownership and gun crimes,” where tipsters can either call, text or drop a dime via the DLE’s website or a downloadable app where they can submit photographs and videos to back up their report.
The governor’s office went even further during the brown shirt recruiting exercise saying, “People reporting tips are encouraged to leave detailed information including the names of those in possession of illegal guns or committing gun crimes, a location where those people may be found and a description of the guns.” Sure, what could go wrong when hiring unpaid, untrained, overzealous, anti-Second Amendment sycophants typically knowing very little about firearms to play the role of a detective, spying on and recording their neighbors?
Meanwhile, Gretchen “Lockdown” Whitmer, known for hosting the most oppressive COVID lockdowns in America while still having more deaths per capita than any neighboring Midwestern states, signed House Bill 5503, a measure passed off as an education funding bill that allocates $1 million in School Aid Funding to support an anonymous tip line for students to report firearms thought to be “improperly stored.”
The bill goes on to mandate that Michigan’s Department of Education develop materials concerning improper storage of firearms, including tip line usage, and distribute those materials to school districts across the state. The Gestapo may not pay you for your work, but you will receive free training, whether you want it or not.
As the NRA-ILA points out, language regarding the tip line was added to the bill as an amendment that was then swiftly passed by the Democrat-controlled legislature.
“The expedited pace and the silencing of opposition when the bill came up for a floor vote underscores the reality that this was a political move and another attack on gun owners,” says the NRA.
These tiplines will ultimately create a situation that will lead to wasted resources, unwarranted confrontations with law enforcement and what could amount to unconstitutional searches of homes, businesses and other private property based on vendettas and other nefarious agendas. Not only does this negatively impact the community’s relationship with authorities, but those who abuse the tip lines will undoubtedly drive wedges within communities as well, drawing lines at a time when we need to be working together to strengthen and solidify those connections.
The ongoing saga between the ATF and Q’s Honey Badger leaves a lot of people asking, “Why the Honey Badger?” For that question, we turned to Rick Vasquez, the former Acting Chief of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Firearms Technology Branch (FTB).
ATF Vet’s Take on Hunting the Honey Badger
Vasquez is uniquely positioned to comment on some of the most incendiary issues affecting American gun owners today. He currently serves as a consultant through RickVasquezfirearms.com. He provides testimony in accordance with statutes and regulations overseeing firearms as well as professional expertise in National Firearms Act/Gun Control Act issues, firearms importation, weapons training, and advanced gunsmith and evaluation services. When gun problems require serious horsepower, Vasquez is the man.
Rick’s Resume
During his 21 years in the Marine Corps, Vasquez served as Chief Instructor at the precision weapons shop at Quantico, Virginia. He fielded the M16A2 service rifle for the 6th Marine Regiment and coordinated the Marines’ development and implementation of the Barrett M82 .50-caliber anti-materiel rifle. He also served as a Marine Security Guard Detachment Commander in three different embassies including Moscow. Vasquez later worked for the State Department Diplomatic Security Service.
Vasquez subsequently transferred to the ATF Firearms Technology Branch, reviewing guns and gear to adjudicate compliance with firearms law. He eventually headed the FTB, crafting determinations of profound importance to the firearms industry. His insights into the inner workings of the ATF are literally unparalleled.
Vasquez subsequently transferred to the ATF Firearms Technology Branch, reviewing guns and gear to adjudicate compliance with firearms law. He eventually headed the FTB, crafting determinations of profound importance to the firearms industry. His insights into the inner workings of the ATF are literally unparalleled.
Vasquez is the archetypal warrior curmudgeon, a self-described “crotchety old guy,” and ever the Marine. He is the cumulative product of countless hard places and countless hard things. He is also a patriot. Vasquez’s devoted his entire adult life to service.
Vasquez isn’t overly burdened about hurting people’s feelings either. He prefers the right thing over political correctness. His observations on politics, guns, and freedom are mesmerizing.
Why the Q Honey Badger?
There are around four million Pistol Stabilizing Braces in circulation today. However, the ATF recently declared that the Q Honey Badger, with its 7-inch barrel and sliding PSB, was actually a Short-Barreled Rifle (SBR). Not only does an SBR require fingerprints, a $200 transfer tax, and a six- to nine-month wait, possession of an unregistered SBR is a felony good for up to 10 years in federal prison.
The current legal morass surrounding PSBs is a ghastly mess. We’ll explore that later. There are no published criteria discriminating PSB-equipped pistols from SBRs. Absent codified definitions the industry cannot determine if they are in compliance. My question to Vasquez was why Q, and why now? Why did the ATF single out the Honey Badger?
“When the first arm braces were approved there was not a great deal of thought put into their approval,” he said. “The letters are on the internet and can be reviewed. The original letter says in essence that they were approved as an arm brace but without specific criteria for features. There was no features test applied. The restrictive features being applied today are evolutionary in an effort at restricting the arm brace.”
No Rhyme or Reason
The FTB analyzes each product via some ethereal “looks like a stock to me”-sort of assessment. The width of the brace, the length of pull, and the orientation of the brace relative to the sights all fold in. This is actually the third time the ATF has administratively reclassified a brace-equipped gun as an NFA item. One case involved Fostech, while another concerned Kalashnikov.
“This opinion letter written on Q’s arm brace is a curious anomaly,” Vasquez said. “ATF opinion letters are typically lengthy, wordy, and spell out the features that are good and, if installed, bad. Now ATF’s response for a standard criterion on an arm brace is that they are not authorized by DOJ to provide criteria. Yet we have at least three seizures of arm braces described as stocks via ‘unwritten criteria.’”
Bully Tactics
There has been one prosecution of someone accused of redesigning a PSB-equipped pistol into an SBR. Vasquez says that the ATF singles out smaller companies because of their relative lack of resources.
“They used an arm brace that lacked the FTISB seal of approval,” Vasquez explained. “What is that seal of approval? Even though they are made as an arm brace and meet the known criteria of an arm brace, there is no regulation requiring ATF approval.”
Companies like SIG, HK, and Springfield Armory have deep pockets and armies of lawyers. Q, Fostech, and Kalashnikov, however, lack the assets to support a protracted and expensive legal fight.
The decision-makers at the ATF know this. These small companies represent low-hanging fruit. A victory against Fostech or Q better positions the ATF to move against larger stuff later. Vasquez believes these latest efforts reflect deliberate attempts to break these smaller companies and build precedents.
“Given the lack of standards if ATF can win a case on the arm brace then they can cite that court case in follow-on cases,” Vasquez said.
Political Motivations
Everything turns on the upcoming election. Entrenched ATF policy-makers with a hardline agenda are positioned to enter a Biden Presidency launching a new regulatory offensive. The White House is pushing back, but Trump is in a political fight for his life. An outgoing President’s power is profoundly diminished.
In fact, the curious case against the Q Honey Badger took yet another turn recently. After an uproar from the firearm industry, the ATF curiously sent another letter to Q’s representative. It informs the ATF backed off the Cease & Desist, taking 60 days to look into the matter further. That 60-day mark would conveniently push a decision to after the election … convenient indeed.
Q announced it would not resume manufacturer of the Honey Badger Pistol at this time. There remains a high level of distrust toward ATF’s motives.
“We believe this 60-day suspension is an effort to put manufacturers, distributors, and consumers at ease, and to postpone the issue pas the presidential election in hopes that a new administration will take a different view,” Q wrote in a response. “Using licensees as political pawns is unbecoming of a regulatory agency and ignoring the underlying evaluation in this letter is simply irresponsible.
Q will not succumb to this level of irresponsibility. Therefore, without further clarification from ATF on their evaluation, we will not continue manufacturing the Honey Badger Pistol.”
ATF Radio Silence
Inquiries from companies like Q and SB Tactical have thus far not been addressed. The ATF meets requests for technical guidance with deafening silence. Vasquez feels that this intransigence reflects intentional stalling.”
“How difficult is it to provide criteria? The ATF interprets the regulations and statutes driven by political leanings,” Vasquez said. “If those making firearm decisions are anti-gun then opinions are written accordingly. This isn’t supposed to be ATF’s method of operation yet here we are.”
The ATF currently appears to be hedging its bets. By dragging its feet until after the election the agency can adapt to changing tides. For American gun owners, however, these tides might very well be portents of a coming hurricane.
“Instruction and direction from this DOJ will simply disappear if the administration loses the election,” Vasquez said. “At that point the antigun agenda espoused by many in the ATF leadership will take off like a rocket.”
————————————————————————————– Yeah I know that this is really old but I thought it very interesting none the less. It just confirms my cynical view of the Government and the right to have a gun. Grumpy
The five-member Okeechobee, Florida city council and Police Chief Donald Hagan may each be forced to pay $5,000 personally – without using taxpayer dollars – for violating Florida’s powerful preemption statute, which only allows the state legislature to regulate firearms.
As previously reported, the city adopted an illegal ordinance shortly before Hurricane Helene made landfall, which banned the sale of guns and ammunition and prohibited firearm possession in public by anyone other than law enforcement or members of the military.
After learning of the civil rights violation, Florida Carry, Inc. sent a demand letter titled Written Notice of Preemption Violation and Offer of Settlement, to the city council and Chief Hagan, warning the recipients they have violated Florida’s preemption statute.
The letter, which was written by Florida Carry, Inc. General Counsel Eric J. Friday, spelled out that the pro-gun group has sufficient standing to bring a lawsuit if the ordinance is not repealed within 30 days, and demanded the payment of $30,000 in damages and attorneys’ fees to “resolve this matter prior to initiation of litigation.”
Okeechobee City Attorney John J. Fumero, in a response sent Wednesday, claimed that the city’s Second Amendment violation was merely an “inadvertent mistake in using an outdated emergency ordinance form that, legally and factually, did not apply to the circumstances at hand regarding Hurricane Helene.”
Besides. Fumero wrote, no one ever enforced the illegal ordinance.
“At no time did the City, or the Police Chief, contemplate, nor take any action, to prohibit, confiscate or otherwise regulate firearms or ammunition in any fashion or manner. This was never the intention of the City. This was never implemented by the City. Moreover, to ensure this never happens again, the City has developed and implemented a new emergency ordinance form and process,” the city attorney wrote.
Fumero’s boss, Okeechobee Mayor Dowling R. Watford, Jr. and police spokesman Detective Jarret Romanello, gave numerous interviews to local media claiming city officials were reviewing the entire incident to determine how the “mistake” occurred. Romanello also claimed he looked forward to “providing more answers as soon as the review is complete.”
In his response, Fumero also balked at Florida Carry’s monetary demand.
“We see no legal, factual or public policy basis for your organization demanding payment of taxpayer dollars to satisfy your assertion of ‘damages and attorneys’ fees. The City is a rural small town that fundamentally believes in gun rights and the Second Amendment. From any standpoint, for Florida Carry, Inc. to take legal action against the City, under the circumstances described herein, is patently inappropriate and unjustified,” he wrote.
In an email reply to Fumero, Friday advised the city attorney to re-read Florida statute Sec. 790.33, which does not require actual enforcement of a preemption violation, since enactment itself is enough to prove liability.
“Inadvertence and ignorance of the law by government is no more of an excuse for violating civil rights than when a citizen ‘inadvertently’ violates the law and is arrested and prosecuted,” Friday wrote. “I will begin drafting my Complaint seeking relief, including personal fines against the city officials under whose jurisdiction this knowing and willful enactment occurred. You may want to inform the relevant officials that they are not allowed to use tax dollars to defend themselves from such liability, and that any fine assessed will be personally payable by them, to alleviate your concerns about tax dollars.
Lee Williams is a board member of Florida Carry, Inc.
This story is presented by the Second Amendment Foundation’s Investigative Journalism Project and wouldn’t be possible without you. Please click here to make a tax-deductible donation to support more pro-gun stories like this.
About Lee Williams
Lee Williams, who is also known as “The Gun Writer,” is the chief editor of the Second Amendment Foundation’s Investigative Journalism Project. Until recently, he was also an editor for a daily newspaper in Florida. Before becoming an editor, Lee was an investigative reporter at newspapers in three states and a U.S. Territory. Before becoming a journalist, he worked as a police officer. Before becoming a cop, Lee served in the Army. He’s earned more than a dozen national journalism awards as a reporter, and three medals of valor as a cop. Lee is an avid tactical shooter.
Gov. Maura Healey’s signing of an emergency order implementing the new gun law in Massachusetts has created “chaos,” according to one gun rights leader. IMG Stock-884183940When Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey signed an emergency enactment of the state’s new gun control law, she was trying to head off a petition drive that would have derailed the new restrictions at least until 2026, according to a report at Mass.live.
The result, however, according to Jim Wallace, executive director of the Massachusetts Gun Owners Action League (GOAL) has been “chaos.” He accused the governor of “once again silencing the voice of the people” by essentially heading off the petition campaign, mounted by a licensed firearms dealer and conducted by a small army of volunteers, which needed to gather at least 49,716 valid signatures from registered voters to put the new law on hold until it could be placed on the 2026 ballot, according to the Associated Press.
By telephone, Wallace told Ammoland that Healey moved fast when it looked like the petition had gathered far more signatures—perhaps several thousand—than necessary. The Boston Globe reported the petition drive had collected more than 65,000 signatures. Counting was to have begun shortly, with a town-by-town breakdown. The Democrat governor was not about to let that happen.
As explained by the AP story, Healey’s emergency enactment “cracks down on privately made, unserialized ‘ghost guns, criminalizes possession of bump stocks and trigger cranks and requires applicants for a gun license to complete live-fire training.” It also expands the state’s “red flag” law—also known as the extreme risk protective order (ERPO) law—authorizing people other than family members, such as health care professionals, to seek court intervention if someone is deemed to be a threat to themselves or others.
The AP report also acknowledged, “The action by Healey frustrates efforts by gun rights activists who had hoped to gather enough signatures to suspend the law before it took effect.”
GOAL has already filed a federal challenge to the licensing and training mandates. Wallace predicted it will take multiple legal actions, each challenging different sections of the law, to correct what he called an “insane” situation. He also predicted that if the law actually goes on the 2026 ballot, “the other side will spend millions to defeat us.”
Interestingly, the way Mass.Live writer John Micek portrays the fight is a “culture war battle” which many may have thought could not happen in such a politically “deep blue” state. Well, surprise, there are tens of thousands of angry, frustrated gun owners in the Bay State.
Indeed, there is much irony in the fact that the Revolutionary War began in Massachusetts with the Battles of Lexington and Concord in April 1775 over an attempt by the British to seize arms and munitions belonging to the militia.
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According to Masslive.com, as of July there were 568,251 active firearms licenses in the Commonwealth, per data compiled by the Firearms Record Bureau. A number that large hints at the potential voter turnout if this measure winds up on a ballot.
In a message posted on the GOAL website, Wallace asserted that Healey, by signing H.4885 into law (Chapter 135 of the Acts of 2024), kept the final language of the bill secret “until the night before the legislature voted on it.” He called it “the worst attack on civil rights in modern U.S. history.”
He is hopeful the federal complaint already filed by GOAL will be taken up “immediately” and will result in an injunction against the law’s enforcement.
How this may play into the November election hasn’t been discussed, but it is clear to GOAL’s Wallace that Massachusetts gun owners are in a prickly mood.
“Massachusetts residents have no idea what to do,” he said. As things stand right now, “nonresidents cannot bring in any gun, period.” That’s not good news as the hunting season is getting underway. The commander of the State Police needs to approve a roster of acceptable firearms, he explained.
On top of everything else, Wallace said ammunition sales must also be recorded.
“It’s insane,” he lamented. “Right now, nonresidents are in danger. If they come into the state with a gun to hunt or compete, they’re a felon.”
If additional lawsuits are filed, it could bog things down if a court decides to issue an injunction against all or parts of the law.
Wallace calls the new law a “tantrum” against the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen in June 2022. That decision, adopted 6-3 and written by Justice Clarence Thomas, was viewed as a landmark change for the way lower courts and state and local governments must address Second Amendment issues. The ruling will have long-term effects on new and existing gun control laws, many of which are being challenged already by gun rights organizations such as GOAL, the Second Amendment Foundation, National Rifle Association, Gun Owners of America, California Rifle & Pistol Association, Firearms Policy Coalition and others.
About Dave Workman
Dave Workman is a senior editor at TheGunMag.com and Liberty Park Press, author of multiple books on the Right to Keep & Bear Arms, and formerly an NRA-certified firearms instructor.