{"id":118797,"date":"2026-09-17T20:11:43","date_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:11:43","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=118797"},"modified":"2026-09-17T20:11:43","modified_gmt":"2026-09-18T01:11:43","slug":"118797","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/?p=118797","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

Justice Department sues San Jose, police over gun permit fee<\/a><\/p>\n

(KRON) \u2014 The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has filed a lawsuit against San Jose and its police department, alleging the city charges private individuals unreasonable fees to exercise their Second Amendment right to lawfully carry a firearm.<\/p>\n

According to a Justice Department press release, San Jose\u2019s firearm permit fee is the highest in the country at nearly $1,600 per license.<\/p>\n

\u201cIndeed, San Jose\u2019s fee towers over those imposed by the country\u2019s biggest cities. New York, Washington, D.C., Boston and Chicago all charge a small fraction of San Jose\u2019s fee,\u201d the Justice Department said.<\/p>\n

complaint_-_us_v_san_jose_police_dept<\/a><\/div>\n

Download<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cAll law-abiding Americans have a constitutional right to bear arms for self-defense. This right is not a luxury reserved for a privileged few, but a fundamental element of our republic,\u201d Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon said. \u201cYou don\u2019t need a law degree to recognize that charging a fee several times higher than the cost of the firearm itself is illogical, and an unconstitutional attempt to impede Americans\u2019 Second Amendment rights.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Justice Department said people who believe a state or local government has infringed on their right to keep or bear arms can submit a complaint <\/a>through its Second Amendment Section.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

San Jose\u2019s city attorney provided the following statement in response to the lawsuit:<\/p>\n

Dear Ms. Dhillon:<\/p>\n

I have received and reviewed your Sept. 9, 2026, letter. Based on my review, the comments expressed therein appear to be based on a number of misconceptions about how the City\u2019s concealed carry weapon (\u201cCCW\u201d) license fee actually works, both in its amount and, just as importantly, when it is collected. The purpose of this letter is to clarify these misunderstandings.<\/p>\n

The City\u2019s $1,591 CCW license fee<\/strong><\/span> is a full cost-recovery fee lawfully charged for the vital public safety purpose of processing CCW license applications.<\/p>\n

It is not an arbitrary number set to discourage applicants. Rather, it reflects the documented, actual and current cost of processing a CCW license application. Of that total, $1,243.52 covers staff time, which has been established at 6.50 hours per application and is supported by a time-and-task analysis. The remaining $347.55 covers indirect overhead. Every dollar of the fee is tied to a specific, auditable cost of performing this work. The calculation is reviewed annually for accuracy and adjusted as required.<\/p>\n

In fact, the San Jos\u00e9 Police Department proactively streamlined its CCW licensing process two years ago, reducing the staff time included in the fee calculation from eight hours to 6.50 hours per application. This directly made the CCW licensing process more efficient and less costly. Contrary to your assertions, a department seeking to erect barriers to the exercise of a constitutional right would not go out of its way to make its own process more efficient.<\/p>\n

Equally important, applicants do not pay the full $1,591 fee up front. This is a central error in your letter. As you may know, California Penal Code \u00a7 26190 authorizes the City to collect up to 50% of the license fee at the time of filing. However, in an effort to simplify the process, the City requires applicants to pay only 20% of the fee \u2014 $318 \u2014 when the application is filed.<\/strong><\/span> The remaining balance is due only if, and when, a license is actually issued. If an application is denied, the City collects nothing further.<\/p>\n

The fee also falls squarely within California state law requirements. California Penal Code \u00a7 26190(b)(1) permits the City to charge \u201ca fee in an amount equal to the reasonable costs for processing the application for a new license or a license renewal, issuing the license, and enforcing the license.\u201d The City\u2019s fee does exactly that, no more. Courts have long recognized that governments may impose fees on the exercise of a constitutional right when those fees are designed to cover the actual expenses of administering the regulation.<\/p>\n

Finally, we disagree that the Bruen, Heller or Wolford cases are applicable. Specifically, the Supreme Court\u2019s concern in Bruen was with fees \u201cput toward abusive ends\u201d \u2014 fees untethered to cost and designed to price ordinary citizens out of exercising their rights. That is simply not the case here. The City of San Jos\u00e9\u2019s fee is transparent, well documented and reviewed annually. Moreover, the fact that the City collects an initial application fee that is far below what the law would allow it to charge demonstrates that the City is committed to making the CCW permit process as efficient and accessible as possible.<\/p>\n

The City remains committed to lawfully implementing California\u2019s shall-issue licensing framework and to ensuring that responsible, law-abiding residents can exercise their Second Amendment rights. We do not believe the facts support a finding that San Jos\u00e9\u2019s fee structure, properly understood, denies that right to ordinary citizens.<\/p>\n

I am available to meet if you believe that would assist in your further understanding of our permit process. We would be happy to walk your office through the detailed and documented time-and-task analysis, the fee schedule and the City\u2019s collection practices. We believe such a conversation would clarify the City\u2019s lawful CCW permit program without the need to expend public resources on additional litigation that will only arrive at the same conclusion.<\/p>\n

I look forward to hearing from you.<\/p>\n

Susana Alcala Wood, City Attorney<\/cite><\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Justice Department sues San Jose, police over gun permit fee (KRON) \u2014 The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has filed a lawsuit against San Jose and its police department, alleging the city charges private individuals unreasonable fees to exercise their Second Amendment right to lawfully carry a firearm. According to a Justice … Continue reading “”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[50,79,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-118797","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-goobermint","category-government","category-rkba"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118797","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=118797"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118797\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":118799,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118797\/revisions\/118799"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=118797"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=118797"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/milesfortis.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=118797"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}