A national gun rights group that has targeted Boulder County’s gun ban, simultaneously filed five lawsuits this week in four separate federal appellate circuits to challenge multiple state and local assault weapons and high-capacity magazine bans.
The National Association for Gun Rights filed cases in Federal District courts representing the First Circuit (Massachusetts), Second Circuit (Connecticut), Seventh Circuit (Highland Park and Naperville, Ill) and the Ninth Circuit (Hawaii), according to a news release from the NAGR.
Cases in the Tenth Circuit against the state of Colorado had previously been filed a month ago, all with local plaintiffs with each state jurisdiction, the news release states.
The NAGR and the Rocky Mountain Gun Owners last month successfully requested that a federal judge temporarily block Boulder County from enforcing one of its newly passed gun control measures. The ordinance prohibits the sale and purchase of assault weapons, large capacity magazines and trigger activators. The ordinance prohibits a person, corporation or other entity in unincorporated Boulder County from manufacturing, importing, purchasing, selling or transferring any assault weapon, large-capacity magazine or rapid-fire trigger activator.
U.S. District Judge Charlotte Sweeney, who approved the temporary restraining order, set a court hearing for Thursday, Sept. 8.
This week, the Longmont City Council met in executive session to discuss enacting its own set of gun ordinances in the city. There has been no indication if those ordinances will be placed before the council for a vote.
“States have been ignoring the Second Amendment and the Heller and McDonald decisions for far too long – and law-abiding gun owners are sick and tired of their unconstitutional antics, which disarm millions of Americans,” said Dudley Brown, President of the National Association for Gun Rights in the news release.
“In light of the Bruen decision and the success we’ve had in suing localities in Colorado, we’re going after every Federal Circuit Court which has upheld egregious firearms bans. They must immediately overturn their ‘assault weapons’ and magazine bans– and our suits argue just that,” Brown said.
These suits come as an extension of existing litigation by local Colorado affiliate Rocky Mountain Gun Owners against several municipal cases where Democrat-appointed federal judges have already granted Temporary Restraining Orders based on the Bruen decision preventing the enforcement of “assault weapons” and magazine ban ordinances, the news release states.
“Our mission has always been to expand pro-gun precedents and defend gun owners,” said Hannah Hill, Research and Policy Director for the National Foundation for Gun Rights, in the news release. “The brilliant decision from Justice Thomas this summer has provided us with the ammo to free millions of law-abiding Americans who are being unjustly denied their gun rights.”
If successful, the National Association for Gun Rights will push to overturn these unconstitutional gun control laws, and establish a national precedent permanently ending all similar bans on commonly owned firearms and magazines across the country, the news release states.
