The Second Amendment Foundation, Firearms Policy Coalition have filed a federal lawsuit challenging California’s one-gun-per-month limit, declaring the restriction a violation of the Second Amendment.
The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California in San Diego. The case is known as Nguyen v. Becerra.
SAF and FPC are joined by the San Diego County Gun Owners PAC, North County Shooting Center, Inc., PWGG, L.P., and six private citizens, identified in court documents as Michelle Nguyen, for whom the case is named, plus Dominic Boguski, Jay Medina, Frank Colletti, John Phillips and Darin Prince.
The complaint, which spans 43 pages, names California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and Luis Lopez, director of the state Department of Justice, Bureau of Firearms in their official capacities as defendants.
Plaintiffs are represented by attorney Raymond M. DiGuiseppe of Southport, N.C.
“California’s one-handgun-per-month purchasing restriction is an unconstitutional prohibition that will also apply to all semiautomatic centerfire rifles starting in July,” noted SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb in a prepared statement. “The policy discriminates against private citizens because it does not apply to motion picture, television or video production companies, which we call the ‘Hollywood exemption.’ The way Becerra and Lopez enforce the law amounts to an infringement on the individual right to keep and bear arms under the Second Amendment, and a violation of the 14th Amendment’s equal protection clause.”
“California’s ban on multiple-firearm purchases in a thirty day period is without rhyme or reason, particularly when that prohibition is compared to those who are exempt from the ban,” added Adam Kraut, FPC’s Director of Legal Strategy. “Such a restriction on the acquisition of arms plainly violates an individual’s Second Amendment rights. We look forward to challenging this ban and are cautiously optimistic that the Court will find, as the D.C. Circuit already has, that the restriction is unconstitutional.”
Gottlieb noted the Second Amendment was incorporated to apply to the states via the 14th Amendment as part of the 2010 Supreme Court ruling in McDonald v. City of Chicago, a SAF case.
“We are asking for an injunction against this law, which shouldn’t really exist in the first place,” he added.
