Current:Home > StocksGun rights activists target new Massachusetts law with lawsuit and repeal effort -WealthRoots Academy
Gun rights activists target new Massachusetts law with lawsuit and repeal effort
Burley Garcia View
Date:2025-04-06 21:06:20
BOSTON (AP) — No sooner had Massachusetts Gov. Maura Healey signed a sweeping new firearms bill into law last month than gun rights activists filed a lawsuit challenging it, calling the measure an “historic attack on our civil rights.”
Activists are also hoping to place a question on the 2026 ballot to repeal the law, which expands the state’s already tough gun restrictions. It was enacted in part as a response to the Supreme Court’s 2022 Bruen decision declaring citizens have a right to carry firearms in public for self-defense.
The Massachusetts measure cracks down on privately made, unserialized “ghost guns,” criminalizes possessing bump stocks and trigger cranks, requires applicants for a gun license to complete live-fire training, updates the state’s tests for what makes a firearm an assault-style weapon and requires an advisory board to provide a ongoing list of prohibited weapons.
The measure also expands the state’s “red flag” law to let police as well as health care and school officials alert the courts if they believe someone with access to guns is a danger and should have their firearms taken away, at least temporarily.
People looking to suspend the law from taking effect until a potential 2026 referendum on it will need to file at least 49,716 signatures from registered voters, which will also help guarantee the question is placed on the ballot. Healey could block any temporary suspension of the law by pushing for an “emergency preamble” putting it into effect immediately.
The federal lawsuit by gun advocates argues the law is unconstitutional, characterizing it as “onerous firearms legislation that imposes sweeping arms bans, magazine restrictions, registration requirements, and licensing preconditions that are as burdensome as they are ahistorical.”
The suit — which cites the Bruen decision — asks the federal court to issue a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction barring the state from enforcing the “burdensome licensing regimes on the possession and carry of firearms for self defense.”
Jim Wallace, executive director of the Massachusetts Gun Owners Action League, a local affiliate of the National Rifle Association, said the group sued in federal court because there “is no hope for any help within the Massachusetts court system.”
He suggested the lawsuit is just the start of a wider legal effort to peel back elements of the law piece by piece, saying it’s too expansive for one court to take it on all at once.
“It’s not about crime. It’s not about accidents. It’s not about suicides,” he said. “It’s a bigoted act against 10 percent of the state’s population,” referring to gun owners.
Democratic state Rep. Michael Day, one architect of the legislation, said he’s confident it can withstand the legal challenges. He predicted voters would back the law if the choice is put on the 2026 ballot.
“We’re trying to save lives,” he said. “One of the reasons people live in Massachusetts is that they can walk down the street without someone coming up on their side and menacing them.”
Cody Jacobs, a lecturer at Boston University School of Law, said the measures that deal with increased licensing requirements aren’t excessively burdensome, don’t prevent gun ownership and don’t infringe on Second Amendment rights.
“Other training requirement for gun owners have been upheld by the courts,” he said. “I’d be pretty surprised if this would be overturned.”
The Massachusetts law prohibits people who aren’t part of law enforcement from carrying guns at schools, polling locations and government buildings. It also requires those applying for a license to carry firearms to demonstrate a basic understanding of safety principles and provides local licensing authorities with relevant mental health information.
District attorneys would be able to prosecute people who shoot at or near homes, which also seeks to ensure people subject to restraining orders no longer have access to guns.
The new law also expands the definition of “assault weapons” to include known assault weapons and other weapons that function like them. It bans the possession, transfer or sale of assault-style firearms or large-capacity feeding devices.
The law also bans issuing a license to carry a machine gun except for firearms instructors and bona fide collectors, and criminalizes possessing parts that are intended to make weapons more lethal by adding them to the machine gun statute. Such parts include bump stocks and rapid-fire trigger activators.
The Supreme Court this summer struck down a federal Trump-era ban on bump stocks.
veryGood! (39)
Related
- NFL Week 15 picks straight up and against spread: Bills, Lions put No. 1 seed hopes on line
- TikToker Alix Earle Hard Launches Braxton Berrios Relationship on ESPYS 2023 Red Carpet
- Pittsburgh Selects Sustainable Startups Among a New Crop of Innovative Businesses
- Texas Regulators Won’t Stop an Oilfield Waste Dump Site Next to Wetlands, Streams and Wells
- A Mississippi company is sentenced for mislabeling cheap seafood as premium local fish
- EPA Moves Away From Permian Air Pollution Crackdown
- Do Solar Farms Lower Property Values? A New Study Has Some Answers
- Yes, a Documentary on Gwyneth Paltrow's Ski Crash Trial Is Really Coming
- Rylee Arnold Shares a Long
- Environmental Advocates Protest Outside EPA Headquarters Over the Slow Pace of New Climate and Clean Air Regulations
Ranking
- North Carolina justices rule for restaurants in COVID
- Do Solar Farms Lower Property Values? A New Study Has Some Answers
- Imagining a World Without Fossil Fuels
- In Louisiana, Climate Change Threatens the Preservation of History
- Off the Grid: Sally breaks down USA TODAY's daily crossword puzzle, Hi Hi!
- Vanderpump Rules' Ariana Madix and Tom Sandoval Spotted Filming Season 11 Together After Scandal
- OutDaughtered’s Danielle and Adam Busby Detail Her Alarming Battle With Autoimmune Disease
- Star player Zhang Shuai quits tennis match after her opponent rubs out ball mark in disputed call
Recommendation
North Carolina justices rule for restaurants in COVID
How Gas Stoves Became Part of America’s Raging Culture Wars
Adrienne Bailon-Houghton Reveals How Cheetah Girls Was Almost Very Different
Mathematical Alarms Could Help Predict and Avoid Climate Tipping Points
2025 'Doomsday Clock': This is how close we are to self
The Botched Docs Face an Amputation and More Shocking Cases in Grisly Season 8 Trailer
Pennsylvania Advocates Issue Intent to Sue Shell’s New Petrochemical Plant Outside Pittsburgh for Emissions Violations
Why Kristin Davis Really Can't Relate to Charlotte York