Category: Government

NSSF Happy with DOJ’s Moves to Protect Gun Rights

A lot of people are displeased with the Department of Justice.
[Yours truly here among them!]

They see mixed signals from an administration that vowed to be strong on gun rights. They see them because they’re present. The DOJ will defend gun rights one day, and oppose them the next. It’s kind of causing a certain degree of whiplash.

But as I noted on Tuesday at the above link, purity was probably never going to happen.

For what it’s worth, though, Larry Keane of the NSSF is pretty happy with what’s happening overall.

President Donald Trump signed his Presidential Executive Order Protecting Second Amendment Rights back on February 7, 2025, instructing U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi to review all presidential and agency actions taken between January 2021 and January 2025 that “purport to promote safety” but infringed on the rights of law-abiding citizens. That includes rules issued by the DOJ and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), classifications of firearms and ammunition, regulatory enforcement policies and even reports issued by the former taxpayer-funded White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention that just pushed gun control.

In other words, for the first time, the Civil Rights Division is directed to treat the Second Amendment as what it is: a civil right deserving active protection, not a second-class right that must constantly give way to regulatory experimentation.

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Preemption Laws Make Lawful Carry Easier…That’ Why They’re Under Attack by the Gun Control Industry.

Preemption laws offer legal protection for gun owners, but only when they are enforced. The work to advance any pro-gun legislation is arduous, more so in Minnesota than most states. But passing a law is only half the battle. This is also especially true in Minnesota, where local officials are concocting yet another illegal scheme to defy the state’s firearm preemption statute.

This has sadly become the norm, as defying preemption is a recognized way for municipal politicians to signal to their anti-gun supporters and donors that if the Second Amendment is no impediment to their plans, neither is a state statute. This contempt is now playing out in Minnesota, where mass noncompliance and legal fairytales are the order of the day.

The city of Saint Paul, Minnesota, recently declared that their city council “stands ready to act on day one when the state lifts preemption” to establish the complete ban on possession of semi-automatic firearms, “large capacity” magazines, binary triggers, “ghost guns,” as well as to create even more “gun-free zones.” It admits, however, that none of their new gun control is actually enforceable under the law as it presently stands.

Current Minnesota law, Minn. Stat. § 471.633, states:

The legislature preempts all authority of a home rule charter or statutory city of the first class, county, town, municipal corporation, or other governmental subdivision, or any of their instrumentalities, to regulate firearms, ammunition, or their respective components to the complete exclusion of any order, ordinance or regulation by them except that:

(a)   A governmental subdivision may regulate the discharge of firearms and

(b)   A governmental subdivision may adopt regulations identical to state law

       Local regulation inconsistent with this section is void.

State law speaks clearly on the matter, and no parts of the adopted or proposed ordinances qualify under the exceptions. Meanwhile, passing illegal legislation on the pretext that the law may someday change doesn’t remedy the violation. Try withholding presently owed taxes in the hope of future amendments to a state’s revenue laws to see where that gets you.

Yet even while acknowledging these efforts as unconstitutional in Minnesota due to the existing firearm preemption law, the Saint Paul City Council unanimously passed the ordinance and became the first city among a coalition of 17 cities that have pledged to do the same.

The city of Edina, Minnesota, attempted a similar effort last week which is now reportedly on hold. Edina Mayor James Hovland noted he wants residents to be able to weigh in at a public hearing first before the city council takes a vote while seemingly ignoring Edina City Attorney David Kendall’s legal input that the city cannot put an effective date on a gun ban until state law is changed and that he doesn’t, “think that the council is in a good position to direct police to enforce [such] an ordinance.”

Without any enforcement ability, these actions are transparently performative political theatre. However, a deeper dive at the continued audacity of jurisdictions to ignore the superior authority of the state illustrates the ongoing danger posed to the rule of law. Fundamental to the principle of law is clarity, and while these local politicians may feel empowered, their actions continue to create confusion and fear for residents and law enforcement officers.

Of course, lawsuits that should not have to be filed have and will be to defend gun owner rights. Judicial ping-pong on an already established legal principle will further contribute to havoc as gun control advocates perceive a dual benefit of virtual signaling and depleting the coffers of their adversaries, who are forced to defend settled law against frivolous attacks.  Taxpayer money will also be spent to defend these “contingent ordinances,” with no material benefit to anyone. The best that can be hoped for, from the gun prohibition point of view, is pure symbolism.

Nevertheless, it’s imperative to hold the line on all laws that protect citizens from officials wanting to create a confusing patchwork of gun control, a long-fought battle for the Second Amendment community as a whole. Preemption vindicates the principles that laws should be consistent, understandable, and fairly applied. The alternative is a regime in which compliance — if it is practical at all — inevitably involves forfeiting one’s own rights. A Minnesotan could travel from one end of the state to another, or he could exercise the full measure of the right to keep and bear arms recognized by state. But he could not do both at the same time.

The enactment of a law is often the beginning of the legal battles, not the end. NRA-ILA’s work involves not only making it easier for law-abiding citizens to carry firearms for self- protection but also providing a protective framework to ensure the law works as intended. The infringement on display in Minnesota is merely one example of many. That’s why state preemption laws, and national efforts like H.R. 38, remain among ILA’s highest priorities.

Like that ‘not a cartel per se’ matters

US labels Maduro-tied Cartel de los Soles as a terror organization. It’s not a cartel per se

CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) — President Donald Trump’s administration has ramped up pressure on Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro by designating the Cartel de los Soles as a foreign terrorist organization. But the entity that the U.S. government alleges is led by Maduro is not a cartel per se.

The designation, published Monday in the Federal Register, is the latest measure in the Trump administration’s escalating campaign to combat drug trafficking into the U.S. In previewing the step about a week ago, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio accused Cartel de los Soles, or Cartel of the Suns, of being “responsible for terrorist violence” in the Western Hemisphere.

The move comes as Trump evaluates whether to take military action against Venezuela, which he has not ruled out despite bringing up the possibility of talks with Maduro. Land strikes or other actions would be a major expansion of the monthslong operation that has included a massive military buildup in the Caribbean Sea and striking boats accused of trafficking drugs, killing more than 80 people.

Venezuelans began using the term Cartel de los Soles in the 1990s to refer to high-ranking military officers who had grown rich from drug-running. As corruption expanded nationwide, first under the late President Hugo Chávez and then under Maduro, its use loosely expanded to police and government officials as well as activities like illegal mining and fuel trafficking. The “suns” in the name refer to the epaulettes affixed to the uniforms of high-ranking military officers.

The umbrella term was elevated to a Maduro-led drug-trafficking organization in 2020, when the U.S. Justice Department in Trump’s first term announced the indictment of Venezuela’s leader and his inner circle on narcoterrorism and other charges.

“It is not a group,” said Adam Isaacson, director for defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America organization. “It’s not like a group that people would ever identify themselves as members. They don’t have regular meetings. They don’t have a hierarchy.”

Maduro’s government in a statement Monday categorically denied the existence of the cartel, describing the Trump administration’s accusation as a “ridiculous fabrication” meant to “justify an illegitimate and illegal intervention against Venezuela.”

Up until this year, the label of foreign terrorist organization had been reserved for groups like the Islamic State or al-Qaida that use violence for political ends. The Trump administration applied it in February to eight Latin American criminal organizations involved in drug trafficking, migrant smuggling and other activities.

The administration blames such designated groups for operating the boats it is striking but rarely identifies the organizations and has not provided any evidence. It says the attacks , which began off the coast of Venezuela and later expanded to the eastern Pacific Ocean, are meant to stop narcotics from flowing to American cities.

But many — including Maduro himself — see the military moves as an effort to end the ruling party’s 26-year hold on power.

Since the arrival of U.S. military vessels and troops to the Caribbean months ago, Venezuela’s U.S.-backed political opposition also has reignited its perennial promise of removing Maduro from office, fueling speculation over the purpose of what the Trump administration has called a counterdrug operation.

 

What are Dangerous and Unusual Weapons?

In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the United States Supreme Court said that the Second Amendment does not protect the right to keep and bear “dangerous and unusual weapons,” it protects only arms in “common use.” In support of its conclusion, the Court cited the following authorities and case law:

United States v. Miller, 307 U. S. 174 (1939), at 179.  4 Blackstone 148-149 (1769); 3 B. Wilson, Works of the Honourable James Wilson 79 (1804); J. Dunlap, The New-York Justice 8 (1815); C. Humphreys, A Compendium of the Common Law in Force in Kentucky 482 (1822); 1 W. Russell, A Treatise on Crimes and Indictable Misdemeanors 271-272 (1831); H. Stephen, Summary of the Criminal Law 48 (1840); E. Lewis, An Abridgment of the Criminal Law of the United States 64 (1847); F. Wharton, A Treatise on the Criminal Law of the United States 726 (1852). See also State v. Langford, 10 N. C. 381, 383-384 (1824); O’Neill v. State, 16 Ala. 65, 67 (1849); English v. State, 35 Tex. 473, 476 (1871); State v. Lanier, 71 N. C. 288, 289 (1874).

Neither the Heller opinion nor any of the cited authorities and case law support that conclusion. Most of the Court’s citations are circular, but all invariably point to English common law and statutes that preceded the adoption of the Second Amendment.

Moreover, had the Court bothered to read its own citations, which in turn cited English common law and statutes, it would have discovered that England did not ban “dangerous and unusual weapons.” England’s prohibitions on the bearing of dangerous and unusual weapons (the citations point to body armor) did not prohibit the possession of those arms. What was prohibited was bearing those arms in public except for certain limited exceptions, such as quashing riots and stopping affrays (e.g., street fights).

Moreover, there was no “common use” test. England was a class-based society with restrictions on the arms one could keep and bear, depending on one’s class. For example, in feudal England, only the upper classes could keep and bear what we today call broadswords, except traveling merchants, whose social class would normally have precluded them from doing so. Not that English peasants and serfs could have afforded to purchase a broadsword.

Which isn’t to say that the lower classes never touched a broadsword. But it would have been in a public defense context, and they were not expected to purchase a broadsword or other weapons of war that they could not afford.

If there were a weapon in “common use,” it was the English longbow, which they could afford. The right to keep and bear arms, and the specific arms protected by the Second Amendment, which we American citizens have the right to keep and bear, simply cannot be reconciled with English statutory and English common law. At least not unless American citizens are analogous to Medieval English serfs and peasants. True, this is a view widely shared by judges and politicians, but it was not the view of the Founding Fathers who wrote the Second Amendment, or the American People who voted to enact the Second Amendment into law, or the view of those who wrote the Fourteenth Amendment that was likewise enacted into law by the American People.

During oral argument in my California Open Carry lawsuit, Judge Bybee put to me that the Second Amendment was based on the English Bill of Rights. I responded by saying that we expanded on those rights. Had I been given the time to elaborate, I would have reminded him that the English Bill of Rights applied only to Protestants (and only some of them), not to Catholics. And, of course, the English “right” to keep arms was a statutory right, not a fundamental right that we Americans have even if there were no enumerated Second Amendment right. Statutory rights exist at the whim of the legislature, and the English Parliament has long since ended any right to keep arms, let alone bear them for the purpose of self-defense.

Judge Bybee would go on to write the 7-4 en banc opinion in Young v. Hawaii (2021) that held there is no right to bear any concealable arm in public, openly or concealed, because their mere existence offends the king.

The United States Supreme Court vacated the Young v. Hawaii decision and threw the case back to the 9th Circuit in 2022.

With the exceptions of prohibitions on the use and/or carrying of concealed weapons, which existed from the 13th century, and throughout the history of American colonial and American states, Heller’s embracement of prohibitions on short-barreled shotguns and machine guns cannot be reconciled with the types of arms the American People intended the Second Amendment to protect when it was enacted in 1791 or when the Fourteenth Amendment was enacted in 1868.

19th-century Courts and legislatures disagreed on whether firearms that are easily and ordinarily carried concealed can be banned, but they were all in agreement that the Second Amendment protects arms used in battle.

And that included cannons, a type of arm that cannot be carried on one’s person. Heller’s exclusion of arms that one would take into battle is ahistorical and inconsistent with Heller’s first citation that justified prohibitions on “dangerous and unusual weapons” and seemingly limited the right to arms in “common use”—United States v. Miller (1939). A decision that makes no mention of “dangerous and unusual.” What Miller said was, “[O]rdinarily when called for service these men were expected to appear bearing arms supplied by themselves and of the kind in common use at the time.”

Indeed, the Supreme Court in Miller adopted the view of many 19th-century courts that the Second Amendment protects only weapons of war—”Certainly it is not within judicial notice that this weapon [short-barreled shotguns] is any part of the ordinary military equipment or that its use could contribute to the common defense.”

In 2008, when the Heller decision was published, the M-16 machine gun was part of the “ordinary military equipment,” and certainly contributed “to the common defense.”

So how did we go from the Second Amendment only protects weapons of war to the Second Amendment does not protect weapons of war?

Technically, the Heller opinion did not say that “M-16 rifles and the like” are not arms protected by the Second Amendment, but the paragraph was so poorly worded that judges have leaped to the conclusion that Heller held that they are not.

In a Fox News interview with Chris Wallace, Justice Scalia said that the Court had not decided whether hand-held rocket launchers that can bring down an airplane or firearms that can fire 100 rounds per minute are, or are not, arms protected by the Second Amendment. In the interview, Justice Scalia gave an example of what the right to keep and bear arms did not protect—walking down Main Street while carrying an executioner’s axe in a manner intended to terrorize the townfolk, as that constituted an affray.

While an executioner’s axe may have been unusual, and is certainly deadly, it wasn’t the axe per se that was prohibited; it was the carrying of the axe in a threatening manner. A woodsman’s or shipwright’s axe was commonly carried, and for certain classes of Englishmen, the carrying (bearing) of swords was required by law and custom. It was not a crime to carry them in public unless they were carried in a threatening manner.

And contrary to the defendants’ position in my California Open Carry lawsuit, which claims that simply openly carrying a firearm is, in and of itself, threatening, I have centuries of English and American common law, as well as California statutory law, saying, and California Courts holding, that merely openly carrying a firearm is not threatening.

Some people hate the mere sight of guns, and concealed carriers hate Open Carry for different reasons, but, for now, there is no Heckler’s veto of the Second Amendment.

The Supreme Court could grant an “assault rifle’’ ban cert petition, and clean up the mistakes made in Heller and NYSRPA v. Bruen, and US v. Rahimi. But I fear that if the Court does, it will simply poke more holes in the Second Amendment.

FPC Calls on President Trump to End Defense of Federal Gun Control Laws

Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) today issued the following statement condemning the Trump Administration’s ongoing defense of federal gun control laws and calling on President Trump to take immediate action to restore the integrity of his pledge to protect Second Amendment rights:

Since President Donald J. Trump signed the “Protecting Second Amendment Rights” executive order in February, his Department of Justice has done exactly the opposite—relentlessly defending the federal government’s unconstitutional gun control regime. Instead of using the Justice Department’s vast power to secure Americans’ right to keep and bear arms, the Trump DOJ has used it to fight against the People—even taking extreme positions in court to resist injunctions that block the government’s enforcement of gun laws that federal judges have already found unconstitutional.

Last month, the Administration’s Solicitor General, D. John Sauer—the government’s top appellate lawyer, often called the “10th Justice” for his influence with the Supreme Court—urged the Court to deny review in a case challenging the National Firearms Act’s (NFA) registration and taxation scheme for short-barreled rifles. The Administration argued that the NFA’s intrusive requirements are “consistent with this Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation,” effectively endorsing the very federal overreach the Second Amendment was written to prevent.

In an effort to convince the Court to dodge the question of unconstitutional federal restrictions, the Trump DOJ suggested that the Court should focus on “laws banning AR-15 rifles.” Yet, when the opportunity arose for the Administration to support exactly such a case—a challenge to an AR-15 rifle ban out of Illinois—the Trump DOJ was silent.

Rather than support good Supreme Court vehicles, the Trump DOJ has chosen to game the system and throw its weight behind bad cases likely to strengthen the government’s power and weaken individual liberty, such as United States v. Hemani, which the Supreme Court recently agreed to hear.

The Trump DOJ’s continuing adversarial posture to the Second Amendment doesn’t end there. In United States v. George Peterson—an FPC-supported Fifth Circuit criminal appeal that challenges the NFA’s unconstitutional registration and taxation of firearm suppressors—the Trump DOJ opposed a petition for rehearing en banc, doubling down on its defense of oppressive federal gun laws.

The Trump DOJ’s sustained pattern of anti-Second Amendment litigation cannot be dismissed as bureaucratic inertia—it reflects deliberate choices.

FPC calls on President Trump to immediately direct his Department of Justice to end its defense of federal gun control laws and to begin using the full power of the executive branch to actively protect and advance the Second Amendment rights of the American people.

Trump Cuts Off Tax Money Pipeline to Gun Control Groups

There’s little that is as upsetting as seeing your tax dollars spent on something you are morally opposed to with every fiber of your being. It’s especially upsetting when that something is an attack on one of our basic civil liberties that’s expressly protected by the United States Constitution.

However, as we found out earlier this year, our tax money was ending up in the bank accounts of various gun control groups, thus we were being forced to fund the effort to strip us of our God-given right to keep and bear arms.

Much of that funding was cut off already, but not all of it.

As the NRA-ILA notes, though, President Trump has cut off even more.

The loss of funding resulted in a lawsuit against the Trump administration brought by five non-profit entities, lead by the progressive Vera Institute of Justice, alleging the cuts were unconstitutional, illegal, and arbitrary and capricious. In July, an Obama-appointed judge of the federal district court for the District of Columbia denied injunctive relief and granted the defendants’ motion to dismiss, ruling that the plaintiffs failed to show the court had jurisdiction over their arbitrary and capricious claim and failed “to demonstrate a violation of any constitutional right or protection.”

The other shoe on these grants has just dropped.

The Trump administration has reportedly retooled the eligibility criteria and focus for these grants going forward. Eligibility to apply for an estimated $34 million in grant money has changed to exclude community-based organizations and non-profit applicants.

The focus is more explicitly on “supporting law enforcement efforts to reduce violent crime and improv[ing] police-community relations” through law enforcement officer and related personnel hiring, equipment purchases that specifically support violence prevention and intervention, youth violence intervention programs, and generally by “increasing the capacity of local government, law enforcement, and the criminal justice system to coordinate comprehensive crime reduction strategies.”…

A look through the archived list of past federal grant recipients (FY 2022 and FY 2023) shows that many of the previous CVIPI grantees have also been funded by Everytown Support Fund’s Community Safety Fund. A very cursory examination of the archived list also reveals a few grant recipients with clear anti-Second Amendment, pro-gun control elements.

Let’s understand that no matter what a program accomplishes with regard to reducing violent crime, if they don’t support gun control, Everytown isn’t backing them. I don’t care what they might claim in that regard; that’s just the simple truth. They’re an anti-Second Amendment organization, and they only support their fellow travelers.

But by changing the criteria like they did, the DOJ has cut off funding that might not explicitly go toward gun control, but would free up other revenue for those purposes. Something else I don’t care about is the claim that the money wasn’t for anti-gun activities, because money is fungible and a dollar in is a dollar in. They only promise not to use X amount for anti-gun efforts.

While gun control organizations are trying to frame this as killing efforts to prevent so-called gun violence, the reality is that there’s little evidence these efforts did a damn thing. Plus, if Everytown and its buddies are that bothered, they’re free to issue their own grants. I’m sure Michael Bloomberg has a spare $34 million lying around.

Why should we, the American people, be on the hook for something that doesn’t seem to do much?

Gov’t. Grant Money for ‘Gun Violence Prevention’ Withheld from Non-Profits

By Dave Workman

The Guardian is reporting that the Trump administration is this year cutting off government grants for so-called “gun violence prevention” programs to certain non-profit groups which the grants were reportedly built around.

While the news agency didn’t specifically say so, there have been concerns within the Second Amendment community that public funds were being utilized by some groups to push a gun control agenda. Essentially, gun owners—as taxpayers—were helping to fund efforts which ultimately were aimed at eroding their Second Amendment rights. At least, that’s the concern.

According to The Guardian, “The Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative (CVIPI), was created in 2022, to support groups working in rural and urban communities struggling to address violence and fund research studying the programs’ efficacy.”

But following Donald Trunmp’s return to the White House, these “community-based organizations” were allowed to apply for grant funds. Now, those monies are limited to city, county and tribal governments, and the new goal of the program is to “support law enforcement efforts to reduce violent crime and improve police-community relations.”

As noted by The Guardian, when Trump returned to office in January, he immediately dismantled Joe Biden’s White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, which was a thinly-veiled “in-house” gun control effort. Instead, Trump nominated Pam Bondi to the office of Attorney General, and she has subsequently led the Justice Department in a full 180-degree shift from gun control to Second Amendment protection. The DOJ, with Harmeet Dhillon as U.S. assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights essentially leading the charge, has gone after the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department for dragging its feet in the issuance of carry permits, holding up the process for up to two years.

Dhillon has also argued against the semi-auto ban in Illinois before the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Earlier this year, the Guardian noted that the Justice Department cut more than $800 million in grants that would have gone to “organizations that prevent and respond to gun violence, sexual assault and hate crimes” and other groups.

Trump Administration Cuts Flow of Tax Dollars Funneled to Leftist Gun Control Orgs and NGOs.

The Trump administration has released solicitations for a grant program meant to stop gun violence in underserved communities. But this year, the non-profits the grant was built around are disqualified from applying, according to an application notice released by the Department of Justice (DoJ) in September.

The Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative (CVIPI), was created in 2022, to support groups working in rural and urban communities struggling to address violence and fund research studying the programs’ efficacy.

The pioneering program was born out of a recognition by the Biden administration that such community-centered programs were among the most successful tools in combating the US’ deep-rooted gun violence problem, and had played a crucial role in helping reduce homicides in major US cities.

Before Trump’s inauguration, community-based organizations, non-profits and local and state governments were eligible to apply for the grant. Now, only city, county and tribal governments are allowed. And the stated goal of the program has been changed from “comprehensive, community-based prevention” to “supports law enforcement efforts to reduce violent crime and improve police-community relations”.

Since 2022, the federal government has awarded more than $300m to over 120 non-profits, city and county governments and research institutions through the initiative, according to an archived list of grant recipients.

The department of justice, which oversees CVIPI, did not respond to a request for comment.

The changes at CVIPI are the latest in the Trump administration’s heel-turn from the Biden administration’s approach to gun violence prevention, which positioned Black and Latino-led groups working to address violence as legitimate solutions to crime in the nation’s hardest hit locales. Shortly after his inauguration, Trump dismantled the White House office of gun violence prevention, and in March his administration removed the former surgeon general Vivek Murthy’s advisory on gun violence as a public health issue from the US Department of Health and Human Services’ website.

— Abené Clayton in Gun violence prevention groups disqualified from grants built around their work

 

Well it sure took them long enough……

Kash Patel’s FBI Cuts All Ties to Southern Poverty Law Center

FIRST ON THE DAILY SIGNAL—The FBI has confirmed that it severed all ties to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a far-left activist group that puts conservatives and Christians on a “hate map” along with Ku Klux Klan chapters. The “hate map” has inspired at least one terrorist attack against a conservative organization.

“The Southern Poverty Law Center long ago abandoned civil rights work and turned into a partisan smear machine,” FBI Director Kash Patel told The Daily Signal in a statement Friday. “Their so-called hate map has been used to defame mainstream Americans and even inspired violence.”

“That disgraceful record makes them unfit for any FBI partnership,” Patel added.

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The FBI confirmed that it has no intelligence products from the SPLC and does not engage in contact or information sharing with the SPLC.

The statement comes days after Patel told Fox News Digital that the FBI had severed ties with the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish nonprofit that opposes antisemitism but also leans left and condemns critics of transgender ideology.

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I wish the Trump administration would be more consistent in pro-RKBA moves like this.

DOJ Sues LA Sheriff Over Gun Permit Delays, Says 2A Violation Scope ‘Staggering’

The Department of Justice on Tuesday filed a federal lawsuit against the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, alleging deliberate foot-dragging by the department in processing applications for California concealed carry licenses.

If this is the first high-profile move fulfilling the mission of the DOJ’s “Second Amendment Enforcement Task Force” announced by Attorney General Pam Bondi in April, it’s a major offensive. The nine-page federal complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California, does not mince words.

“The scope of this constitutional violation is staggering,” the complaint says. “Between January 2024 and March 2025, Defendants received 3,982 applications for new concealed carry licenses. Of these, they approved exactly two—a mere 0.05% approval rate that cannot be explained by legitimate disqualifying factors alone. This is not bureaucratic inefficiency; it is systematic obstruction of constitutional rights.”

The complaint, submitted by Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, Acting U.S. Attorney Bilal A. Essayli for the Central District of California and other DOJ officials in Washington, D.C. and Los Angeles, declares, “The mechanics of this obstruction are equally damning. Defendants force applicants to wait an average of 281 days—over nine months—just to begin processing their applications, with some waiting as long as 1,030 days (nearly three years). The median delay is 372 days. These delays far exceed California’s own statutory requirement that licensing authorities provide initial determinations within 90 days, demonstrating Defendants’ flagrant disregard for both state law and constitutional obligations.”

Named as defendants are the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and Sheriff Robert Luna, in his official capacity. The department did not immediately offer a response.

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DOJ Issues “Relief From Disabilities” Proposal

On July 22, the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) issued a proposed rule to revive a statutory process for the restoration of Second Amendment rights lost under federal law as a result of convictions or other disqualifying circumstances. NRA-ILA will be submitting its own comments on the proposal, and we urge our members to do so as well. Thoughtful, pro-gun comments will ensure the best outcome for this critical program.

NRA often emphasizes that it represents peaceable, law-abiding gun owners. Yet the Second Amendment is a restraint on government; it is not a prize the government bestows only on whom it chooses. There are limits to the restrictions the government can place on gun ownership, even when (as is almost always the case) it claims to be acting in the interest of “public safety” or “keeping guns out of the wrong hands.” Rights restoration is an important corrective measure when the government’s “public safety” efforts overshoot the mark.

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Trump Can (and Should) End Semi-Auto Import Ban Right Now

My first “evil black rifle” was an AK that I built from a kit. Yeah, I know, an evil “ghost gun,” though the term was still years away from becoming uttered, much less mainstream. A gunsmith friend told me to get an 80 percent receiver, a parts kit, and some compliance parts, then we all gathered at his workshop for a day of building AKs, general BSing, and some grilled burgers partway through the day.

It was an absolute blast.

We had to get a parts kit, though, because we couldn’t just import completed AKs, even modified to semi-auto only. During Bush Sr’s administration, he banned the import of semi-automatic firearms for “non-sporting purposes” such as those so-called assault weapons.

My parts kit was a Romanian AK that had the receiver cut in three places with a torch. Now, they also cut the barrels, all because people built guns.

However, as Trump has set this term as the most pro-gun administration in my lifetime, there’s something else he could do, and gun rights groups should be asking for it, as David Codrea notes at Firearms News.

“There’s something else Trump could do quickly that would not require Congressional approval,” this column reported online last November in Donald Trump and Republicans Owe Gun Owners, and It’s Time to Collect. Focused on pledges the president had made to gun owners to solicit their votes, the article explored decisions within the president’s power to make that would help make good on his promises.

What Trump could do, on his own authority, is end the 1989 import ban on semi-automatic rifles pejoratively designated as “assault weapons.” That ban, put in place by Republican President George H.W. Bush, imposed “a permanent import ban on 43 types of semiautomatic assault rifles, including the Chinese-made AK47 and Israeli-made Uzi carbine,” per The Washington Post. The rationale was they “were not being used for sport as required by the Gun Control Act of 1968.” This approved gun control by a Republican president opened the gates for many states and municipalities to ban military-styled semi-auto firearms nationwide without a peep from the Bush Administration or his anti-2A Attorney General William Barr who would later become President Trump’s “best people” attorney general during his first term.

The ban would be “very easy” to overturn, Firearms News Editor-in-Chief Vincent DeNiro assessed. But how? GCA ’68 was a law enacted by Congress. The classification of the semiautos was not.

“President Trump doesn’t even need Congress to get rid of the unconstitutional 1989 ‘assault weapons’ import ban, he just needs to order the BATFE to declare all imported semi-auto rifles as ‘sporting,’ which is what these same models are considered when domestically produced,” DeNiro explained last year. “If he wants to go down in history as a Second Amendment hero, he can make this happen on day one.”

That’s the absolute truth, but Trump didn’t do that on day one, unfortunately.

Still, he could do it now. Semi-autos are still imported. They’re made domestically as well. There’s literally no reason for this ban to be in place except to make it harder to lawfully own these firearms.

More than that, groups like Gun Owners of America, the Second Amendment Foundation, the NSSF, the National Association of Gun Rights, and the NRA should all be challenging the Trump administration to do just that. Lift the import ban. These weapons are, in fact, used for sports–three-gun competition is a sport, as is varment hunting, deer hunting, and so on–and the ban is wrong on every level.

President George H.W. Bush was not a friend of the Second Amendment. That’s clear as day, and he set the stage for the federal assault weapon ban in 1994 by this action. He made it clear that these particular rifles were too dangerous for regular citizens to own, at least in his view, and as the leader of the Republican Party at the time, it gave a green light to a lot of lawmakers that this was OK.

It wasn’t.

It’s time to end this and do it now.

The Trump Administration Announces Major Changes to U.S. Citizenship Test

The government has unveiled substantial changes to the US naturalization civics test, announcing a return to more rigorous standards for prospective citizens.

These updates, effective for applicants filing after mid-October, are intended to ensure a deeper understanding of American history, government, and civic values, according to US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS).

Expanded and More Challenging Content

The revised test, as outlined in the Federal Register notice , seeks to modernize and strengthen the assessment of civics knowledge.

Officials state that the new questions, format, and evaluation criteria are designed to challenge applicants to demonstrate not just rotate memorization, but a deeper conceptual understanding of core American values, historical turning points, and the structure of government authorities.

The revised test increases the pool of possible questions from 100 to 128, reintroducing updates first implemented in 2020 and rolled back during the previous administration. Applicants now face 20 questions, of which they must answer at least 12 correctly, compared to answering 6 out of 10 in the previous version.

The test remains an oral exam, with a wide range of topics including the Constitution, significant wars, influential figures such as Thomas Jefferson, and examples of American innovation.

Notably, the passing score is unchanged, but administrators can stop the exam after 12 correct or 9 incorrect answers, streamlining the process while maintaining rigor. Most applicants will take the exam in English, although some exceptions exist for older, long-term residents.

New Vetting and Character Assessment Standards

Alongside changes to the test content, the administration is implementing stricter criteria for evaluating applicants’ moral character and societal contributions. Guidance to USCIS officers now instructs them to consider a broader range of behaviors and revives neighborhood investigations to help verify eligibility.

Additionally, the agency has clarified that any involvement in illegal voting, illegal registration, or false citizenship claims will disqualify applicants from meeting good moral character requirements.

Rationale and Broader Context

USCIS spokesperson Matthew Tragesser stated that “ American citizenship is the most sacred citizenship in the world and should only be reserved for aliens who will fully embrace our values ​​and principles as a nation,” and that the changes are designed “to ensure only those aliens who meet all eligibility requirements, including the ability to read, write, and speak English and understand US government and civics, are able to naturalize.”

He framed the move as promoting full assimilation and strengthening the integrity of American citizenship, calling these “critical changes… the first of many” planned under the current administration.

This announcement has sparked renewed debate in political and civic circles over the balance between making the citizenship process demanding and ensuring it remains fair and accessible.

Florida’s new tax holiday expands to all guns and ammo

PINELLAS PARK, Fla. – Florida shoppers are getting another round of tax-free savings, this time on outdoor gear. Beginning Monday, the state’s new sales tax holiday applies to hunting, fishing, and camping supplies.

But the biggest change: for the first time, firearms and ammunition are included — and unlike most items, they are not subject to a price cap. That means everything from ammo to high-end rifles will be exempt from sales tax through the end of the year.

At Bill Jackson’s Gun Shop in Pinellas Park, manager Mike Sfakianos said customers are already preparing, with layaway deposits piling up ahead of the holiday. “Anytime you could save a buck on something, especially these days, it’s a good time,” Sfakianos said.

<div>Bill Jackson’s Shop for Adventure in Pinellas Park</div>
Bill Jackson’s Shop for Adventure in Pinellas Park
The backstory

Gov. Ron DeSantis coined it the “Second Amendment Summer Tax Holiday.” It’s part of a broader slate of Florida tax breaks that recently expanded to include hurricane supplies year-round.

Most outdoor items are capped: tents under $200 and fishing rods under $75, for example. But firearms and accessories come without. 2025 Hunting, Fishing, and Camping Sales Tax Holiday

The other side

Not everyone is on board. Critics argue that exempting expensive firearms while capping children’s clothing during the back-to-school tax holiday sends the wrong message. They also question whether shoppers are truly using the purchases for hunting.

<div>Bill Jackson’s Shop for Adventure in Pinellas Park</div>
Bill Jackson’s Shop for Adventure in Pinellas Park
What’s next

The holiday will run through the end of 2025, giving Floridians months to take advantage of the tax-free status on firearms, ammunition, and outdoor equipment.

The Source

This reporting is based on FOX 13 coverage, including interviews with local gun shop owners and details released by Florida state officials.

: Moral Imperative: After Senate Vote, North Carolina House Needs to Override Governor’s Veto of Permitless Carry.

North Carolina gun owners are watching closely to see where their elected officials stand. Will they cave to gun control pressure or stand with law-abiding citizens exercising their rights?

In June, North Carolina Gov. Josh Stein vetoed SB 50, the legislation that would allow permitless concealed carry, or constitutional carry, of firearms by law-abiding North Carolinians. By the end of July, the Tarheel State Senate countered by overriding the governor’s original veto.

Needless to say, gun control activists and antigun groups aren’t happy about that development. They prefer infringing on Second Amendment rights and penalizing law-abiding Americans instead of holding criminals accountable for their actions when they break the law. Gun control advocates are putting pressure on N.C. state lawmakers as the bill heads back to the House at the end of August where, if the lower chamber also overrides Gov. Stein’s veto, Constitutional carry will become law.

Joining the Crowd

In North Carolina, opponents of SB 50 are crowing about public safety and the “potential for increased gun violence.” Gun control groups would prefer to leave responsible Americans defenseless and their continued shouts of “increased gun violence” ring hollow. After all, that was the playbook run after the landmark 2022 U.S. Supreme Court Bruen decision striking down New York’s subjective and overly burdensome “may issue” concealed carry permit requirements. Americans approved of the Bruen decision by a large margin. Still, several states reexamined gun control laws despite the fact that law-abiding gun owners weren’t the criminal nemesis gun control advocates predicted they would become overnight.

Now, North Carolina is at a crossroad. Lawmakers can trust those who overwhelmingly obey the law or cave to gun control pressure.

Supporters of SB 50 agree the bill protects individual liberties enshrined in the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment. If the House follows the Senate and overrides Gov. Stein’s veto, it would make North Carolina the 30th Constitutional carry state. Other states that have adopted such freedom include Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Vermont, West Virginia and Wyoming.

The House veto override vote could come as early as August, but – given the close margin in the state’s lower chamber – is not a done deal.

‘Safety Precautions’ for Whom?

Like clockwork, the gun control group Everytown for Gun Safety is now declaring that the North Carolina House overriding Gov. Stein’s veto of SB 50 would “eliminate the safety precautions that are currently in place,” and that in the last several years, criminal misuse of a firearm has increased. Notably, they make no mention of the bail reform policies and soft-on-criminal prosecutors in North Carolina cities that have contributed to the surge in criminal violence.

That’s unsurprising. Gun control advocates have never been bothered over taking away Constitutional freedoms from law-abiding Americans. They grasp onto the misguided belief that guns are the root of evil, not the craven hearts of those who have no respect for the law. They would uproot the rights of those who obey the law even as they ignore criminals illegally obtaining firearms for illicit purposes, and policies which put these same criminals back onto our streets.

Taking away Constitutional rights – and the natural right to self-defense – isn’t going to stop criminals. Only enforcing the law will do that. Recent history shows that law -abiding Americans from all walks of life choose to exercise their right to keep and bear arms over surrendering to fear of crime.

No Time for Facts

Gun ownership among law-abiding Americans has surged in the last five years, including through the addition of at least 26 million new first-time gun owners since 2020. While crime spiked nationwide in the early 2020s – including in North Carolina – these high marks have come down since a few years ago. Moreover, these declines have taken place at the same time that firearm ownership increased, and more states have adopted permitless carry freedoms.

In a recent podcast from The Reload, Jeff Asher of AH Datalytics spoke about how the murder rate is down overall, and how it will likely continue to drop through the end of the year.

“Murder peaked sometime at the end of 2022. In 2023, it had the largest one-year decline ever recorded,” Asher explained. “In 2024, it had the largest one-year decline ever recorded – likely – we don’t have the FBI’s 2024 numbers yet. And 2025 we’re seeing the largest one-year decline ever recorded. So, an even larger decline than what we saw last year in our sample.”

The Reload’s Stephen Gutowski added, “and one of the most under-covered stories out there is this crime trend of just huge decreases in murder, to the point where we’re getting it seems like we’re on track, right, to have the lowest murder rate, perhaps in recorded history.”

So, while gun control activists, antigun politicians and the media continue to portray “gun violence” as an interchangeable issue with lawful gun ownership, the actual trends belie their hyperbolic predictions. Lawful gun owners simply won’t become overnight criminals if North Carolina’s House overrides Gov. Stein’s SB 50 veto.

Here’s the real truth that’s been proven in 29 other states that already adopted Constitutional or permitless carry laws. If the North Carolina House votes to override Gov. Stein’s veto, it will mean North Carolinians will have more options to exercise their Second Amendment rights and protect their families, homes and businesses from criminals that blatantly and openly ignore the laws.

 

Oh, That’s Why Democrats Don’t Want a New Census

On Thursday President Donald Trump directed the U.S. Commerce Department to conduct a new population count without illegal aliens.

“I have instructed our Department of Commerce to immediately begin work on a new and highly accurate CENSUS based on modern day facts and figures and, importantly, using the results and information gained from the Presidential Election of 2024. People who are in our Country illegally WILL NOT BE COUNTED IN THE CENSUS. Thank you for your attention to this

The directive sent Democrats into a meltdown and thanks to White House Deputy Chief of Staff Stephen Miller, we know why.

Without illegal aliens counted in the U.S. Census, which determines congressional representation in Washington D.C., Democrats would be in the minority.

“They stole 20 or 30 House seats by counting illegal aliens in the census, and now you have Democrats talking about, ‘Oh, Republicans can’t change their congressional maps!’ You have literally brought invaders into this country by the tens of millions to RIG the results of the census, and the apportionment of congressional seats!” Miller says. “And then on top of that, of course, you have a situation where even though Republicans won a landslide in the House popular vote, Democrats have so thoroughly rigged and gerrymandered and manipulated their districts beyond all recognition that Republicans only gained a 4-seat majority, despite winning a much smaller majority in the popular vote in 2010 and getting 63 seats.”

Not only did the 2020 census count illegal aliens (like previous counts) – but it was wildly inaccurate – conveniently benefiting Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives.

In a shocking report that has not received the attention it deserves, the U.S. Census Bureau recently admitted that its 2020 Census count of the American population was incorrect in at least 14 states.

And those mistakes were costly to certain states in terms of congressional representation, number of electors, and money those states are likely to receive from the federal government during the next decade. To put the scope of these mistakes into perspective, contrast the errors in the Census Bureau’s latest recount (the 2020 Post-Enumeration Survey, or PES) with the recount from a decade ago (the 2010 Post-Enumeration Survey)—in which there was a net overcount of a mere 0.01 percent (36,000 people), a statistically insignificant error.

As explained below, as a result of these errors, Florida did not receive two additional congressional seats and Texas did not receive one more congressional seat. Meanwhile, two other states, Minnesota and Rhode Island, each retained a congressional seat that they should have lost, and Colorado gained a new seat to which it was rightfully not entitled.