SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Democrats running California’s government have passed some of the strictest gun laws in the country, but those efforts to restrict firearm access are increasingly facing successful challenges in court.
Gun rights groups have been aggressively fighting the laws, often winning initial rulings in their favor before heading to appeal. They’ve gotten a recent boost from the 2022 U.S. Supreme Court decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, which set a new standard for interpreting gun laws. That standard says gun laws must be assessed by whether they are “consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”
They won again on Wednesday, when a federal judge temporarily blocked a law that would ban people from carrying guns in most public places.
The law banned people from carrying guns in most public places. The list included all daycare and school grounds, college campuses, government and judicial buildings, medical facilities, public parks and playgrounds, correctional institutions, public transit, public demonstrations and gatherings, athletic and professional sporting facilities, public libraries, amusement parks, zoos and museums, places of worship, banks, polling places, gambling establishments, any place where alcohol is sold and any other privately owned commercial establishment that is open to the public — unless the business owner put up a sign saying guns are OK.
In 2022, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down New York’s law that required people to show a need for carrying a gun when applying for a permit to carry a concealed weapon. California’s law was similar to New York’s law. This year, the Democrats who control the state Legislature passed a new law that they said compiled with the court’s ruling.
