Massachusetts Fails to Kill Lawsuit Over Nonresident Carry Permit Delays

A federal judge allowed key claims challenging Massachusetts’ recurring nonresident carry-license delays to move forward. iStock-655078450

Massachusetts cannot make a Second Amendment lawsuit disappear simply by issuing carry permits after it has already kept lawful citizens disarmed for months.

That is the central takeaway from a federal judge’s refusal to dismiss the core claims in Lawson v. Campbell, a lawsuit brought by the Second Amendment Foundation, Gun Owners Action League, and three nonresident gun owners challenging Massachusetts’ burdensome License to Carry process.

Chief U.S. District Judge Denise Casper allowed the plaintiffs’ as-applied Second Amendment claim and their Fourteenth Amendment equal-protection claim to proceed. The decision is not a final ruling that Massachusetts violated the Constitution, but it is a significant procedural victory that moves the case toward discovery—and forces the Commonwealth to defend how its licensing system actually operates.

Massachusetts may call its system “shall issue.” According to the lawsuit, however, the state’s one-year nonresident licenses, recurring delays, and refusal to provide a renewal grace period leave lawful gun owners unable to carry for extended periods year after year.

That is not a minor administrative inconvenience. It is government-imposed disarmament.

One-Year Permits and Months of Waiting

Massachusetts treats nonresident gun owners far more harshly than its own residents.

A resident License to Carry can remain valid for six years. A nonresident generally receives a temporary license lasting only one year. Both are charged a $100 application or renewal fee, meaning a nonresident may pay the same amount every year that a resident pays once every six years.

New nonresident applicants must also appear in person at the Firearms Records Bureau in Chelsea, Massachusetts. Applicants face background checks, fingerprinting, training requirements, and other bureaucratic demands before receiving government permission to exercise a right protected by the Constitution.

Massachusetts law generally requires a licensing authority to approve or deny an application within 40 days. The state’s own website reportedly warns nonresidents that processing may take as long as 90 days. The plaintiffs allege even longer delays.

Brian Burns, a Florida resident who maintains a home in Massachusetts, has held at least four nonresident licenses. According to the complaint, one timely renewal was delayed so badly that his new license was not issued until nearly six months after the previous license expired.

Christopher Penta, a New Hampshire resident who frequently travels into Massachusetts for work and family visits, has maintained a nonresident license since 2018. He alleges that one renewal was issued almost two months after his existing license expired.

Russell Lawson Jr., a New York resident who owns a Massachusetts hunting cabin, applied for his first nonresident license in January 2025. His earliest interview was scheduled for June. Lawson missed that appointment because of an unexpected work obligation, and the state rescheduled him for October. Officials subsequently requested information concerning an undisclosed out-of-state charge. He eventually received his license in March 2026.

Although Lawson’s individual application involved additional complications, the court found that the plaintiffs collectively alleged a recurring licensing problem sufficient to keep the lawsuit alive.

Late Approval Does Not Erase the Injury

Massachusetts argued that the case was moot because the individual plaintiffs eventually received their licenses. Judge Casper rejected that position.

The court recognized that sufficiently long licensing delays can themselves constitute constitutional injuries. A citizen who cannot legally carry a firearm for self-defense while Massachusetts sits on his application has lost the exercise of that right during the delay. A permit issued months later cannot restore the days when he was forced to travel disarmed.

The judge also found that the delays could qualify as “capable of repetition, yet evading review.” Nonresident licenses must be renewed annually, the individual plaintiffs intend to continue traveling to Massachusetts, and Burns and Penta allege that they have already experienced recurring renewal delays.

Massachusetts cannot run out the clock, issue the permit after a lawsuit begins, and then claim there is nothing left for a federal court to review.

That point reaches beyond this case. AmmoLand recently covered similar permit-delay litigation involving the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department. Anti-gun jurisdictions lost their ability to demand a special need for self-defense after New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. Bureaucratic delay cannot become the replacement for the discretionary carry bans that Bruen struck down.

Second Amendment Claim Moves Forward

The court dismissed the plaintiffs’ facial challenge to the Massachusetts licensing system. A facial challenge requires showing that the law is unconstitutional in every application, and Judge Casper concluded that the plaintiffs had not cleared that demanding hurdle.

The as-applied challenge is another matter. The judge found that the plaintiffs plausibly alleged delays extending well beyond Massachusetts’ 40-day statutory period. When those delays are combined with one-year licenses and no grace period, the system can deprive nonresidents of their right to carry.

The court declined to establish a bright-line rule defining exactly when a licensing delay becomes unconstitutional. It did, however, reject Massachusetts’ argument that only delays lasting 18 months or several years can implicate the Second Amendment.

Most importantly under Bruen, Massachusetts did not identify a historical tradition supporting the alleged delays. The as-applied Second Amendment claim therefore survived the motion to dismiss.

Nonresidents Face Arrest While Residents Receive Protection

The plaintiffs’ equal-protection claim also survived. Massachusetts residents receive a grace period when they submit timely renewal applications. Nonresidents do not. When a temporary nonresident license expires, its holder can be forced to choose between entering Massachusetts disarmed or carrying under threat of arrest and prosecution.

The court found that this alleged distinction could penalize the constitutional right to interstate travel. Because the plaintiffs plausibly alleged an underlying Second Amendment injury, Judge Casper considered the application of strict scrutiny rather than automatically accepting any justification Massachusetts could invent.

The Commonwealth identified its general interest in public safety and verifying applicants’ eligibility. It did not explain why denying nonresidents a grace period—or subjecting them to delays beyond the statutory deadline—was narrowly tailored to serve that interest.

The judge consequently refused to dismiss the equal-protection claim.

Rights Do Not Stop at State Lines

The Second Amendment Foundation correctly described the ruling as a major procedural advance.

“Massachusetts begrudgingly makes carry permits available for out-of-state residents,” SAF Senior Director of Legal Operations Bill Sack said, while making the annual process unconstitutionally burdensome.

SAF founder Alan Gottlieb put the larger principle more plainly: “The Constitution doesn’t know state lines, and neither do our rights.”

AmmoLand has previously warned that forcing Americans to obtain separate government permission from every hostile jurisdiction they might visit turns interstate travel into a legal minefield. Massachusetts’ treatment of nonresidents has already produced extensive litigation, including the cases discussed in our earlier coverage of the Commonwealth’s cross-border carry restrictions and its supposedly reformed nonresident licensing system.

The court also dismissed the plaintiffs’ claim under the Article IV Privileges and Immunities Clause. That loss and the dismissal of the facial Second Amendment claim should not be ignored. But neither changes the importance of what survived.

A permit does not create the right to bear arms. The right existed before Massachusetts imposed its application, fee, fingerprinting, interview, and annual renewal requirements.

When the government prevents a qualified citizen from carrying for months, the constitutional injury occurs during every day of forced disarmament. Massachusetts will now have to defend that conduct instead of burying the case under a stack of late-issued permits.

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About Duncan Johnson:

Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.

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Supreme Court Considers Concealed Carry Reciprocity Fight

The Johnson v. Jacobson petition asks the Supreme Court whether Minnesota can refuse to recognize Jeffrey Johnson’s valid Florida and Georgia carry licenses. Composite image by AmmoLand News using an original AI-generated illustration and the public court filing in Johnson v. Jacobson.

A long-haul truck driver is asking the U.S. Supreme Court to decide whether Minnesota can shut off his right to bear arms the moment his rig crosses the state line—even though he holds valid carry permits from two other states.

The case, Johnson v. Jacobson, Supreme Court No. 26-255, goes directly at the nationwide patchwork of carry-permit reciprocity laws that forces armed citizens to navigate changing rules, buy multiple permits, or surrender access to a defensive handgun while traveling.

Jeffrey M. Johnson Sr. filed his petition for a writ of certiorari on August 24, 2026, asking the justices to review an Eighth Circuit decision upholding Minnesota’s selective recognition of out-of-state carry permits.

The case presents a simple constitutional question with enormous consequences: Does the right to bear arms belong to the American citizen, or does it exist only within the borders of whichever state issued his permit?

Two Permits, but Minnesota Demands Another

Johnson is a Georgia resident who drives commercially throughout the country. He holds valid firearm licenses from Georgia and Florida and regularly carries a handgun because of the dangers long-haul truckers can face while transporting cargo and living out of their rigs.

According to the petition, Johnson makes several trips to or through Minnesota each year. His routes change constantly, and he may not know that his next load will take him into Minnesota until he completes the previous delivery.

Minnesota does not recognize his Georgia or Florida permits.

Unless Johnson obtains a separate Minnesota permit, state law requires him to unload his handgun and secure it in a closed container when he enters Minnesota. A defensive firearm locked away and unloaded is hardly ready when a criminal decides to attack.

Johnson is not prohibited from possessing firearms. The petition describes him as an undisputed law-abiding citizen with no history of violent behavior and no disqualification that would prevent him from receiving a Minnesota permit. Minnesota still requires him to submit to another licensing process.

A nonresident may apply for a Minnesota permit, but the application must be submitted in person to a county sheriff. The fee can reach $100, and the sheriff generally has up to 30 days to issue or deny the permit. The permit is then sent to the applicant’s home address.

That is not a minor inconvenience for a long-haul driver who spends much of his life on the road. More importantly, constitutional rights are not supposed to depend on how many fees a citizen has paid or how many plastic permission cards he can fit in his wallet.

Eighth Circuit Calls Reciprocity a “Convenience”

Johnson originally challenged Minnesota’s law in federal district court. The district judge agreed that his proposed conduct, carrying a handgun publicly for self-defense, fell within the plain text of the Second Amendment.

The court nevertheless upheld Minnesota’s law at the second stage of the Bruen analysis, accepting historical surety laws as a sufficient analogue for the state’s licensing and reciprocity system. The Eighth Circuit affirmed in May, but it took a different route.

The appeals court held that Minnesota’s reciprocity statute, considered separately from the state’s general permit requirement, does not regulate conduct protected by the Second Amendment. In the panel’s view, the reciprocity statute merely exempts some visitors from obtaining Minnesota permits.

Because Johnson had conceded for purposes of the case that Minnesota’s shall-issue permitting system is constitutional, the court concluded that Minnesota could require every nonresident to obtain a Minnesota permit. Recognizing another state’s permit was merely a “convenience” based on interstate comity.

The court even compared firearm permits to professional licenses, observing that states generally do not have to recognize professional credentials issued elsewhere. That comparison misses the target completely.

Working in a state-regulated profession is not an enumerated constitutional right. Carrying a firearm for self-defense is. The Second Amendment does not say the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed unless a citizen crosses into a state that dislikes the standards used by his home state.

A Right Cannot Become an Exemption

The petition argues that Minnesota’s reciprocity statute does affect protected conduct because it independently determines whether Johnson may carry his handgun.

Before entering Minnesota, Johnson can carry. After crossing the border, he must unload and secure the handgun. When he leaves Minnesota, he can resume carrying it.

Calling reciprocity an exemption does not change what the law does to the person standing on the receiving end of it.

The Eighth Circuit’s reasoning allows a state to define the constitutional right out of the case. First, the state prohibits public carry without its permission. Then it calls recognition of another state’s permit a discretionary benefit. Finally, it argues that withholding that benefit does not burden the right because the traveler can always apply, pay, wait, and obtain another permit.

Under that logic, states could turn the Second Amendment into what the petition calls a “state-line lottery.”

The petition relies heavily on the Supreme Court’s recent decision in Wolford v. Lopez, which declared that the Second Amendment has the “same meaning in all parts” of the country. AmmoLand has previously examined how Wolford may support national carry reciprocity and why states cannot use administrative workarounds to reduce carry rights to government permission.

Johnson is asking the Court to apply that national constitutional standard to the moment an armed citizen crosses a state boundary.

Minnesota’s Surety-Law Argument Falls Apart

The petition also challenges the district court’s reliance on historical surety laws.

Those laws did not presume that every traveler was dangerous. They generally required an accusation that a particular person posed a threat, a hearing before a judicial officer, and a finding of cause before requiring that individual to post a bond. Even then, the person was not necessarily prohibited from carrying.

Minnesota’s law works in the opposite direction. It strips ready access to a firearm from an entire class of licensed, law-abiding travelers without any accusation, hearing, or individualized finding of dangerousness.

Johnson has already passed the requirements imposed by Georgia and Florida. Minnesota is not responding to anything he has done. It is rejecting the permits he holds because state officials do not consider the issuing states’ licensing laws sufficiently “similar” to Minnesota’s standards.

That is the government presuming danger from paperwork, not from the citizen’s conduct.

A Narrow Case With Nationwide Consequences

This petition does not ask the Supreme Court to establish nationwide constitutional carry or abolish state permit requirements. Johnson conceded Minnesota’s shall-issue system during the litigation and instead argues that a state operating a permit system must recognize valid licenses issued by every other state.

However, this case shows exactly why Congress should pass national Constitutional Carry. Gun owners should not have to wait years for the courts to dismantle the state-by-state permit trap one lawsuit at a time. Passing legislation before the midterm elections would protect lawful travelers now and give voters a clear record of which candidates will defend the Second Amendment when it counts.

Second Amendment absolutists should be clear: The right to bear arms should not require any government license. The constitutional command is “shall not be infringed,” not “shall issue after payment, training, paperwork, and approval.”

Still, Johnson v. Jacobson gives the Court a clean opportunity to stop states from forcing lawful travelers to assemble a collection of carry permits to exercise one constitutional right.

Minnesota may prefer its own licensing rules, but constitutional rights are not local favors handed out by state officials. A law-abiding American does not lose the First Amendment, Fourth Amendment, or right to due process when crossing from one state into another. The Second Amendment deserves no less.

The Supreme Court has not agreed to hear the case. The justices must first decide whether to grant the petition. But the question is now squarely before them: Can a state make a citizen’s right to armed self-defense disappear at the border simply because his permit came from somewhere else?

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About Duncan Johnson:

Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.

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Maryland Carry Case Asks Supreme Court to Finish What Wolford Started

The Supreme Court will consider whether to hear Novotny v. Moore, a challenge to Maryland’s sweeping restrictions on where licensed citizens may carry firearms. IMG Duncan Johnson

The fight in Novotny v. Moore has moved to the next stage. Now the Supreme Court must decide whether Maryland’s sprawling “sensitive places” scheme deserves review, or whether the Fourth Circuit should be ordered to take another look after Wolford v. Lopez.

Attorneys for Maryland carry-permit holders and the Second Amendment Foundation, Firearms Policy Coalition, Maryland Shall Issue, and Maryland State Rifle & Pistol Association filed their reply brief on September 2. The Supreme Court simultaneously distributed the petition for its September 28 conference, completing the scheduled briefing in Supreme Court No. 25-1324.

That September gathering is commonly called the “long conference” because it is the justices’ first conference after the summer recess. The Court will work through a substantial backlog of petitions accumulated over the summer, with Novotny now among them.

The Court could grant review, deny the petition, relist it for another conference, or grant, vacate and remand the Fourth Circuit’s decision for reconsideration under Wolford. No outcome is guaranteed, but the challengers have given the justices a direct question: Did Wolford protect the right to carry during an ordinary day, or may Maryland still criminalize carry across entire categories of ordinary public life?

Wolford Changed the Fight

When AmmoLand covered the original Novotny petition in May, the Supreme Court had not yet decided Wolford. That changed on June 25.

In Wolford v. Lopez, the Supreme Court struck down Hawaii’s default prohibition on licensed carry inside private businesses open to the public. The Court held that Hawaii had “hobbled” the right to carry arms for self-defense while Americans go about their daily lives.

Maryland insists Wolford does not threaten its remaining location bans. According to the state, its restrictions take a “targeted approach” and would not interfere with the hypothetical “ordinary day” the Supreme Court examined in Wolford. The reply brief tears into that claim.

Maryland prohibits carry on mass transit, in many healthcare facilities, throughout enormous state parks and forests, at amusement venues, and anywhere licensed to sell alcohol for on-site consumption—including restaurants. Those are not obscure locations encountered only on unusual occasions. They are places Marylanders routinely visit.

The challengers call the result a “death-by-a-thousand-cuts approach” to the right to bear arms.

That is the new issue now confronting the Supreme Court. Hawaii tried to wipe out lawful carry across private businesses with one sweeping default rule. Maryland divided its restrictions into separate statutory categories. The drafting method differs, but the constitutional injury remains: peaceable citizens are stripped of the means of self-defense as they move through everyday life.

Maryland Defends an Arbitrary Mess

Maryland argues that Supreme Court review would be premature because lower courts supposedly agree on the principles governing sensitive places. It wants the justices to permit more “percolation” among the circuit courts.

The reply brief points out the obvious problem: More time will not repair a test that is producing incoherent and openly arbitrary results.

The Fourth Circuit upheld Maryland’s restrictions using an assortment of theories. It relied on government ownership to support the transit ban, private railroad rules from the 19th century as additional transit analogues, later urban-park regulations to uphold bans in wilderness areas, and broad concepts involving crowds, social gatherings, education, science and vulnerable populations.

Those categories can be manipulated to cover nearly anywhere.

A restaurant becomes sensitive because it serves alcohol. A museum becomes sensitive because it is educational. A hospital becomes sensitive because vulnerable people are present. A stadium becomes sensitive because it draws a crowd. A state forest becomes sensitive because someone might use it for recreation.

That is not a principled boundary. It is a list of excuses for extinguishing the right to bear arms wherever anti-gun judges consider firearms “ill-advised.”

The Ninth Circuit acknowledged the same problem in its earlier Wolford decision when it admitted that its list of approved and rejected sensitive places could “appear arbitrary.” Maryland now tries to pass that incoherence off as fidelity to the Supreme Court’s historical test.

The petitioners respond that constitutional analysis should be disciplined, reasoned and understandable. A court should not reach results it cannot explain in ordinary terms and then blame Bruen for the confusion.

Maryland’s Historical Case Falls Apart

The reply also dismantles the historical restrictions Maryland uses to defend its bans. Maryland begins with the medieval Statute of Northampton, but Bruen already explained that the statute targeted carrying arms in a manner that terrorized the public. It did not impose a blanket prohibition on peaceable carry for self-defense.

From there, Maryland jumps to an 1817 New Orleans ballroom ordinance and a small collection of later state, territorial and municipal restrictions. Several were adopted after the Civil War. Others came from territories with tiny populations or individual municipalities. Four of the state restrictions cited by Maryland were enacted by former slave states during or immediately after Reconstruction.

That scattered record does not establish a widespread American tradition dating to the adoption of the Second Amendment.

Maryland also cites post-Civil War court decisions that do not carry the weight the state assigns them. One relied on a cramped militia-only understanding of protected arms that Bruen later identified as an outlier. Another preserved a law by construing it as a restriction on concealed carry rather than a complete carry ban. A third involved carrying a firearm into a courthouse, not a ban throughout unsecured public locations.

Maryland is trying to turn historical fragments into a government power the Founding generation never recognized.

Disarmament Without Protection

The petitioners argue that Founding-era restrictions at courthouses, legislative assemblies and polling places shared an important characteristic: The government secured those locations.

Maryland disputes that historical principle and complains that a security-based standard would be difficult to administer. But Maryland offers no better limiting principle. Its approach allows the government to disarm citizens without screening entrants, securing the premises or assuming responsibility for anyone’s safety.

Maryland gets the prohibition. The permit holder gets the risk.

The reply makes clear that the Supreme Court does not have to adopt government-provided security as the exclusive test to rule for the challengers. Under Bruen, Maryland bears the burden of establishing a valid historical tradition supporting its laws. Attacking the challengers’ proposed principle does not relieve the state of that burden.

If Maryland cannot produce representative historical analogues, its bans must fall.

What Happens Next?

The Supreme Court docket lists Novotny for the September 28 conference. The first public indication of the Court’s action will likely come through a subsequent orders list, although the petition could be relisted without explanation.

Most of the challenged Maryland restrictions remain enforceable. However, the Fourth Circuit stayed its mandate while the Supreme Court petition is pending. Because the district court had permanently enjoined the prohibitions at public demonstrations and locations serving alcohol, those two restrictions appear to remain blocked during the stay.

The Fourth Circuit’s injunction against Maryland’s private-property default rule also remains in place. That issue was effectively resolved by Wolford and is not the dispute the petitioners are now asking the Supreme Court to hear.

The remaining question is larger: Can Maryland accomplish through a stack of location bans what Hawaii could not accomplish with a single private-property rule?

Wolford established that the Second Amendment protects more than possession of a carry permit. It protects carrying a firearm for self-defense while going about ordinary life. The Supreme Court should take Novotny and finish enforcing that command.

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About Duncan Johnson:

Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.

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California Passes Conditional Ban on 3D Printers Without Firearm-Blocking Software

California AB 2047 could require 3D printers sold in the state to inspect digital files and block print jobs involving firearms or machine-gun conversion devices. Credit: AI-generated editorial image created for AmmoLand News.

California has passed AB 2047, the California Firearm Printing Prevention Act, and the bill is now on Governor Gavin Newsom’s desk.

The measure, authored by Assembly Member Rebecca Bauer-Kahan, would eventually require consumer 3D printers sold or transferred in the state to include “firearm blocking technology” intended to identify and stop print jobs for firearms and certain illegal parts, including machine-gun conversion devices. After weeks of amendments, the Legislature sent the enrolled bill to the governor in the closing hours of the 2026 session. Newsom has until the end of September to sign or veto it.

The version that reached his desk is far narrower than the bill that first cleared the Assembly in May. The Senate stripped several of the most aggressive enforcement tools after lawmakers and industry groups argued they were technologically infeasible or overbroad. Gone are the original criminal misdemeanor for disabling the software, the $25,000-per-violation civil penalties, the mandatory manufacturer self-attestation process, and a public roster of “compliant” models.

The final text keeps an exemption for printers used exclusively to make entertainment-industry props and lets the California Department of Justice create additional exceptions by regulation. It also shields people who share digital firearm files solely to test or develop blocking software.

What remains is a delayed, contingent mandate. Beginning no later than July 1, 2027, the DOJ must check quarterly whether ASTM International has published industry standards for firearm-blocking technology on 3D printers. If ASTM issues qualifying standards, the department then has 24 months to publish its own written guidance or regulations describing minimum performance requirements. One year after those state standards appear, it would become unlawful to sell, offer for sale, or transfer a 3D printer in California that lacks compliant blocking technology. If ASTM has not published standards by July 1, 2029, the department is relieved of further duties under the act, and the sales restriction may never take effect.

The bill does not operate in a vacuum. California already prohibits unlicensed people from using a 3D printer or CNC mill to manufacture a firearm under Penal Code § 29185. Separate statutes restrict machines whose “sole or primary function” is to make guns and create civil liability for distributing “digital firearm manufacturing code” to unlicensed persons. AB 1263 and related 2025–26 measures further expanded definitions of firearm manufacturing machines and accessories effective January 1, 2026. AB 2047 tries to move one step upstream by making the printer itself refuse certain files.

California is not the first state down this path. New York enacted a similar blocking-technology law earlier this year. Sacramento modeled AB 2047 on that approach, then made the California version more conditional after the Senate rewrite.

Critics say the concept still fails on both technology and law. 3D-printing companies, the ACLU of California, Hollywood prop shops, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, and gun-rights groups argue that detection algorithms are easy to evade with slightly modified files, offline machines, older printers already in circulation, or out-of-state purchases. They also raise First Amendment concerns about treating design files as something the state can force hardware makers to censor, and they warn that unreliable software would burden schools, small businesses, and hobbyists. Several analyses noted that the Senate rewrite left the actual sales ban hanging on a private standards body that may never act.

Supporters, including Everytown for Gun Safety and the bill’s author, frame AB 2047 as a response to recovered 3D-printed guns and unfinished frames. They describe it as a way to cut off a pipeline for untraceable weapons before a file becomes a firearm.

Even if Newsom signs the bill, nothing changes at the store counter tomorrow. The mandate is years away, if it arrives at all. The practical fight now is whether ASTM writes a standard the state can adopt—and whether software that must inspect every print job can ever work well enough to survive both evasion and a courtroom.

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About John Crump

Mr. Crump is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons, follow him on X at @right2bear, or at www.crumpy.com.

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ATF Statement in Rare Breed Trigger Litigation Raises Questions on Legal Authority

The Justice Department argues that restricting competing forced reset triggers through Rare Breed’s patent litigation would advance ATF’s interest in limiting FRT sales and distribution. This is an AI-generated illustration and does not depict an actual ATF investigation. AI-generated illustration created with OpenAI for AmmoLand News.

The Justice Department is again lending the federal government’s weight to Rare Breed Triggers’ private patent-enforcement campaign, and ATF is remarkably candid about what it hopes to accomplish.

DOJ filed a seven-page Statement of Interest on August 31 in In re: Rare Breed Triggers Patent Litigation, the consolidated litigation pending before Chief U.S. District Judge Amos L. Mazzant III in the Eastern District of Texas.

“The government, through the ATF, has a strong interest in promoting the safe use of firearms by the public, and in this particular case, in discouraging unregulated manufacture of forced reset triggers that allegedly infringe Rare Breed’s patents,” the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives asserted in a Monday filing in United States District Court.

“The government submits this Statement of Interest to provide the Court with the ATF’s views on public interest considerations for the four-factor test for a preliminary injunction,” ATF declared. “For a preliminary injunction, the four-factor test requires a showing of (1) a likelihood of success on the merits; (2) a likelihood of irreparable harm (with no adequate remedy at law); (3) the balance of the hardships is in favor of the party seeking injunction; and (4) that an injunction is in the public interest.”

“This statement of interest is substantively parallel to a January 26, 2026 statement the government filed in ABC IP LLC and Rare Breed Triggers v. Timothy Hoffman et al.,” ATF explained, noting “the government is filing this statement of interest to ensure its interests are represented in the consolidated proceedings and for purposes of judicial economy.”

Second Amendment journalist John Crump reported on that intervention, noting the dispute is over allegations that the Hoffman “super safety” infringes on Rare Breed Trigger patents.

“What makes this case extraordinary is the federal government’s intervention. The ATF’s filing explicitly states that it has a ‘strong interest… in discouraging unregulated manufacture of forced reset triggers,’” Crump wrote.  “It argues that enjoining Hoffman would advance public safety and support the agency’s broader efforts to limit the proliferation of FRTs. Remarkably, the government cites a May 2025 settlement agreement it reached with Rare Breed, after years of aggressive enforcement actions against the company, as justification for now backing Rare Breed’s private patent enforcement crusade.”

Len Savage, firearms designer, expert witness, and president of Historic Arms, LLC, has more basic concerns: Where does ATF presume it gets the authority from to limit proliferation? And he asked that question – and more – in a Tuesday email to the lawyer who filed the Statement of Interest, Walter Brown, Senior Litigation Counsel,  Commercial Litigation Branch, Civil Division, U.S. Department of Justice.

“Section III of the statement does NOT state what law or regulation you are basing this interest on?” Savage asked.  “You mention 18 U.S.C. § 922(o); see also 26 U.S.C. § 5845(b) but then acknowledge that Forced Reset Triggers are NOT machineguns? (Therefore, not regulated under either).”

“Your statement appears to admit YOU and DOJ are using Rare Breed as an ATF proxy to enforce something other than United States Code or the Code of Federal Regulations–  Rate of fire,” Savage noted. “Please show me anywhere in the U.S.C. or C.F.R. that rate of fire is regulated in any way?   Only method of fire is regulated.  If it fires more than once per function of the trigger it’s highly regulated.  If not, there is NO regulation.”

His concerns are legitimate, his points dead-on. Whether or not — and how — they are responded to will tell gun owners much.

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About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.

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Third Circuit Upholds Machine Gun Ban, Creates Bruen Loophole for Gun Registration

The Third Circuit ruled that machine guns are protected “Arms” but upheld the federal ban and NFA suppressor-registration requirements in United States v. Berger. iStock-474974084

The Third Circuit ruled that machine guns are protected “Arms,” then upheld the federal ban anyway. Its treatment of suppressor registration may be even more dangerous for gun owners.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit handed the federal government two victories Monday, upholding Joseph Paul Berger’s convictions for possessing machine guns and unregistered suppressors.

The machine gun ruling in United States v. Berger is bad enough. The court acknowledged that machine guns fall within the Second Amendment’s plain text, only to uphold the federal ban by declaring them unsuitable for lawful civilian use.

The court’s suppressor analysis could reach much further. A two-judge majority held that registration requirements judges consider “minimal” do not infringe the Second Amendment at all. Under that reasoning, the government can escape the historical test required by N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen merely by convincing a court that its registration scheme is not burdensome enough to count.

Federal Agents Found Machine Guns and Suppressors

Berger is a decorated Navy veteran living in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. According to the September 1 opinion, federal agents began investigating after intercepting a package containing three suppressors shipped from China to Berger’s home.

A subsequent search uncovered more than five dozen firearms, including 13 fully automatic firearms—mostly AK-pattern variants—and approximately 12 suppressors. Agents also found evidence that Berger and his father had purchased parts used to convert semiautomatic firearms into machine guns.

Berger pleaded guilty to possessing a machine gun under 18 U.S.C. § 922(o) and possessing an unregistered suppressor under the National Firearms Act. His plea agreement preserved his right to appeal the rejection of his Second Amendment challenge.

Writing for the court, Judge Stephanos Bibas opened with a remarkable endorsement of gun bans:

“Gun bans are strong medicine. But occasionally, they are just what the doctor ordered.”

That is not constitutional analysis. It is a federal judge announcing that some arms may be banned whenever the government considers them too dangerous for ordinary people to possess.

Third Circuit Admits Machine Guns Are “Arms”

The court first made an important concession: machine guns are unquestionably covered by the Second Amendment’s text.

“At step one, machine guns are firearms, so they are ‘Arms’ protected by the text of the Second Amendment.”

That should have placed the burden squarely on the government to prove that banning an entire category of bearable arms is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.

Instead, the court leaned on Heller’s discussion of “dangerous and unusual weapons” and concluded that machine guns are not commonly used for lawful purposes. It described them as “indiscriminate weapons of war and crime, not self-defense ones” and asserted that their rate of fire makes them unsuitable for personal protection.

The opinion relies heavily on twentieth-century material, including congressional reports, testimony concerning criminal use of Thompson submachine guns, and laws enacted by at least 29 states between 1925 and 1934. The panel admitted that those statutes were not Founding-era analogues, using them instead to show a supposed “rapid consensus” that automatic weapons were dangerous.

The court never seriously confronts the government-created scarcity problem.

Congress closed the registry to newly manufactured civilian machine guns through the Hughes Amendment in 1986. The government now prohibits ordinary Americans from acquiring newly manufactured machine guns, restricts the available supply to grandfathered firearms, drives prices into the tens of thousands of dollars, and then points to the resulting lack of widespread ownership as proof that these arms are “unusual.”

As AmmoLand recently explained, the government should not be permitted to manufacture its own constitutional justification. If the government can suppress ownership long enough and then use that suppression to defeat the right, “common use” becomes a ratchet that works only against gun owners.

Court Calls the NFA a Shall-Issue System

The majority’s treatment of suppressors is potentially more consequential. The parties agreed that suppressors are “Arms,” but the majority declined to decide that question. Instead, Judges Bibas and Restrepo held that the NFA registration process did not infringe the Second Amendment because it imposed only an incidental burden.

At the time relevant to Berger’s prosecution, that process required applicants to provide personal information, fingerprints, a photograph, identifying information about the suppressor, local law-enforcement notification, registration and serialization. It also required payment of a $200 tax for each suppressor.

The court brushed that aside as an ordinary shall-issue licensing system.

“Because minimal, objective buying-and-selling regulations are not infringements, they are outside the scope of the Second Amendment.”

That is the most dangerous sentence in the opinion.

Bruen says that when the Second Amendment’s text covers a person’s conduct, the government must prove that its restriction is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition. The Third Circuit has now created a way around that command: call a registration system “minimal,” decide it does not amount to an infringement, and stop before forcing the government to produce any historical analogue.

A federal registry connecting particular firearms to particular owners is not the same thing as confirming that a buyer is not legally prohibited from possessing a firearm. Registration is designed to identify and track the gun itself. It also carries felony consequences for anyone who possesses an unregistered item.

The Second Amendment does not contain an exception for infringements that federal judges consider convenient, objective or sufficiently inexpensive.

Judge Chung Refuses to Join the Majority’s Reasoning

Although Judge Cindy Chung joined the judgment affirming Berger’s conviction, she expressly refused to join the majority’s suppressor-registration analysis.

Chung noted that the government had not argued that registration failed to “infringe” the Second Amendment. The government instead defended the law under Bruen’s history-and-tradition inquiry.

She also warned that the majority’s new test may conflict with Supreme Court precedent:

“Judge Chung would consider the parties’ and amici’s views, as she perceives some tension between this approach and the Supreme Court’s rejection of means-end scrutiny and interest balancing.”

Chung reached the same result through a different path, concluding that a suppressor is an accessory unnecessary for a firearm to function as intended and therefore falls outside the Second Amendment’s protection.

That accessory theory is also deeply flawed. Suppressors reduce muzzle blast and protect shooters’ hearing. Dismissing a functional part of a firearm as an unprotected “accessory” gives courts another way to strip constitutional protection from magazines, triggers, sights and other components necessary to use arms effectively.

The NFA Fight Is Far From Over

The ruling does not erase the recent victory in Silencer Shop Foundation v. ATF. That case invalidated major NFA registration and approval provisions on Congress’s enumerated-powers authority after the applicable taxes were reduced to zero. The district court did not decide the Second Amendment claims, and its injunction protects specified plaintiffs, members and customers.

Berger’s prosecution involved the earlier $200 tax, and his challenge was decided as applied to his circumstances. The Third Circuit specifically noted that Berger presented no evidence of excessive waiting periods and did not argue that the tax was exorbitant.

Still, the Justice Department will undoubtedly use Berger to defend the registry in future Second Amendment litigation. That makes this more than another machine gun case.

The Third Circuit admitted that machine guns are “Arms,” allowed the government to benefit from the scarcity its own ban created, and declared that some federal gun registration does not even implicate the Second Amendment.

Gun owners should pay attention. The most damaging part of this opinion is not limited to automatic weapons or suppressors. It is a judicially invented loophole around Bruen—one that future courts could use to excuse firearm registration whenever they decide the burden is small enough.

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About Duncan Johnson:

Duncan Johnson is a lifelong firearms enthusiast and unwavering defender of the Second Amendment—where “shall not be infringed” means exactly what it says. A graduate of George Mason University, he enjoys competing in local USPSA and multi-gun competitions whenever he’s not covering the latest in gun rights and firearm policy. Duncan is a regular contributor and editor-in-chief for AmmoLand News and is responsible for AmmoLand’s daily gun-rights reporting and industry coverage.

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Qilin Hackers Leak ATF Investigation Files After Ransomware Breach

Qilin published approximately 6.3GB of files it claims were stolen from ATF’s legacy CALEA investigative system. ATF says eForms and its other operational systems were not affected. AI-generated image created for AmmoLand News

For a brief period on Monday, the Russian-linked ransomware group Qilin posted over 6GB of files it claimed were stolen from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.

The dump followed last week’s public listing of the ATF on Qilin’s leak site, first reported by AmmoLand News. Although the files have not been officially authenticated by the bureau, AmmoLand News sources inside the ATF have said the material is genuine.

Qilin is a Russia-based cybercrime syndicate that sells ransomware-as-a-service. Affiliates use its tools to break into target networks, steal data, and then post a countdown on Qilin’s dark-web blog. If the ransom is not paid by the deadline, the group publishes the stolen files. The ATF timer hit zero on Monday. Qilin then released more than six gigabytes of data for a short window before taking the files down. When Qilin pulls a dump, it often means a ransom was paid. There is no public evidence that the ATF paid.

Even after the files disappeared, enough of the package was recovered to identify the compromised environment. The breached system was the ATF’s Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act (CALEA) system.

CALEA, enacted in 1994, requires telephone companies and other covered communications providers to design their networks so law enforcement can carry out court-authorized wiretaps and electronic surveillance. The FCC later applied the statute to facilities-based broadband providers and interconnected VoIP services. Carriers typically meet the technical standard with industry specifications such as J-STD-025 and must file System Security and Integrity plans with the FCC. Turning an intercept on is supposed to require a court order or other lawful authorization, plus a carrier employee who actually activates it.

The ATF’s CALEA system is not the phone companies’ networks. It is the bureau’s own internal system for handling material from federally authorized intercepts—wiretaps, communications monitoring, and related investigative records. Officials describe it as a legacy standalone system, isolated from the rest of the ATF network.

Other data holdings, including out-of-business records, were not accessed. The entire CALEA environment was not emptied.

The ATF says it detected the attack in progress and shut the system down before the attackers could take everything. Certain field offices appear in the leaked set.

“The standalone system was not connected to any other ATF systems, including any case management systems, laboratory systems, or eForms systems, and it was quickly shut down when the breach was discovered,” an ATF spokesperson said. “This is an ongoing investigation, and no further details can be shared at this time.”

In a Monday update, the bureau acknowledged claims that material from the CALEA system had been published, said it could not yet confirm the authenticity, nature, or scope of that material, and repeated that other operational systems were not affected and that the mission continues. Senior Justice Department officials had already labeled the event a “major incident,” a designation that triggers congressional notification.

BREAKING

After a 72 hour countdown expired, Russian ransomware gang Qilin briefly published 6.3GB of data it hacked from ATF.

The data includes criminal investigation target names, phone numbers, IP addresses, iCloud data, Cellebrite phone dumps, and more. https://t.co/pq63X4DvPx pic.twitter.com/2FjqOEoqNw

— Gun Owners of America (@GunOwners) August 31, 2026

What circulated during the brief leak window concerned targets of ATF investigations. The subjects were under scrutiny for firearms trafficking, arson, explosives, organized crime, and the illicit trade in tobacco and alcohol. The records included phone data and IP addresses. The material appears to span roughly 10 to 15 years. Several listed investigations have no readily available public case file. AmmoLand News is reviewing those entries.

The leak’s operational risk is obvious even if the enterprise network stayed clean. Investigative target lists, intercept-related phone records, and IP data can reveal who the bureau was watching, how it was watching them, and which field offices were involved. That information can compromise sources, alert subjects, and complicate open cases. Segmentation limited the blast radius. It did not make the stolen contents harmless.

The episode also raises harder questions about how the ATF’s network is actually run. Most Qilin attacks start with social engineering, especially spear phishing. A spear-phishing message is aimed at a specific user—the weakest point on most networks. The email tries to trick that person into handing over privileged credentials or opening a file that installs a remote-access trojan. The malware then “calls home” and gives the attacker a foothold. Patches close software holes. They do not close human ones. Training and procedure reduce the odds. They never drive them to zero.

Best practice is to shrink the number of people who can reach sensitive systems and to treat legacy intercept platforms as high-value targets, not leftovers.

AmmoLand News has found that the ATF maintains an unusually large number of administrators relative to other agencies. More administrators means a wider attack surface and more accounts worth stealing. That finding, and related questions about access control on isolated systems that still hold years of investigative data, will be examined in later reporting.

For now the official picture is incomplete by design. The ATF will not attribute the intrusion to Qilin in public, will not describe the initial access path, and will not say whether data left the building before the system was pulled offline. Qilin, for its part, treated the ATF listing like any other double-extortion job: name the victim, run the clock, publish, then yank the files. The brief Monday dump is what the public got. Sources familiar with the bureau’s systems say it was enough to confirm that the CALEA store—not eForms, not case management, not the labs—was the one that broke.

That distinction matters for gun owners watching eForms and for investigators who rely on intercept records. It does not answer how a standalone system holding a decade-plus of target and communications data was reached in the first place, or why so many people inside the agency still have the keys. Those are the questions the next stories will have to press.

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About John Crump

Mr. Crump is an NRA instructor and a constitutional activist. John has written about firearms, interviewed people from all walks of life, and on the Constitution. John lives in Northern Virginia with his wife and sons, follow him on X at @right2bear, or at www.crumpy.com.

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