We Will Not Comply: Only .1% of Illinois Gun Owners Have Registered Their Newly Banned Guns So Far

According to Illinois State Police data, 2,415,481 gun owners call the Land o’ Lincoln home. Earlier this year, Gov. J.B. Pritzker signed the so-called Protect Illinois Communities Act into law which banned the most many of the most popular guns used for self-defense. Under the law, existing owners of these now verboten firearms must register their guns by January 1, 2024 or face felony charges.

Four weeks into the gun registration window, exactly 2430 of those FOID holders have registered their guns, accessories, or .50 caliber firearms. That works out to .1006%, or about one in a thousand.

What’s even more remarkable is the number of FOID holders choosing to comply has fallen with each passing week.

In other words, Illinois gun owners have declined to participate in the state’s gun ban.

Granted, not all FOID holders own the guns that are now banned under the law. However, given the popularity of America’s favorite rifle, the AR-15, not to mention semi-auto shotguns, sales numbers suggest that the majority of them have at least one semi-auto rifle or shotgun in their collection. Or perhaps (gasp!) a handgun with a threaded barrel.

As the Executive Director of Guns Save Life, I’ve heard from gun owners across the state.  GSL has meetings in 11 throughout Illinois each month. The resounding answer I hear is, “Register my guns? Hell no.” The second most common reply is that they’re planning on taking most, if not all of their banned guns out of state ahead of the January 1 deadline.

Either way, Guns Save Life has taken the position that gun owners should not register anything. In fact, “DO NOT REGISTER” is the cover story in this month’s issue of GunNews. That’s probably a source of irritation to Governor Pritzker and the Illinois State Police.

After week one, when the compliance rate stood at .04%, William Kirk published a video entitled, “The State That Won’t Comply.”

Time will tell if he covers the fact that the Land of Lincoln’s gun owners have a pretty resounding message for Governor Pritzker and his merry band of anti-gun jihadists. The family-friendly version of that message is, “Go pound sand.” The real message is two words and starts with an “f” and ends with “off.”

In the meantime, Guns Save Life, the Federal Firearms Licensees of Illinois, the Aurora Sportsman’s Club and Gun Owners of America have challenged the “Protect Illinois Communities Act” in court. In fact we just filed an amended complaint to give Judge Stephen McGlynn a second bite at striking down the law.