By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
The Trace—a pro-gun control publication backed by anti-gun billionaire Michael Bloomberg—acknowledges in a new report that New York residents, in the three years since the Supreme Court’s landmark Bruen ruling which struck down the state’s unconstitutional licensing law, are arming up.
Taking advantage of their restored Second Amendment rights, “tens of thousands of New Yorkers have sought permits to carry concealed weapons outside the home,” The Trace laments.
The 1,890-word essay by writer Ted Alcorn takes an in-depth look at what some might consider a social phenomenon, while others look at this trend as an exercise of the long-denied right to keep and, especially, bear arms for personal protection.
In June 2022, the Supreme Court handed down a ruling in the case of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen that shook the foundations of restrictive gun control like an earthquake. In the opinion, authored by Associated Justice Clarence Thomas, the high court said restrictive permit schemes like the one enforced in New York, California, New Jersey, Maryland and a few other states violated the Second Amendment. What wasn’t stated, but was definitely understood by the firearms community, was that these laws had always been unconstitutional. It just took the Supreme Court a hundred years to say so.
But New York’s anti-gun lawmakers didn’t comply with the high court ruling without making the process as difficult as possible. The Trace article talks about the new licensing process, which requires completion of a 16-hour training course, a “written proficiency exam,” and a live-fire exercise. As noted in the story, “That’s more training hours than any state but Maryland and Illinois requires, according to legal experts.”
One paragraph in Alcorn’s report bears notation, as it underscores the desire of a population to enjoy a newly-restored fundamental right.
“Since the law changed,” Alcorn wrote, “more than 17,000 New Yorkers have been approved for permits, and over 8,000 additional applications are pending as of October 1. (For comparison, fewer than 4,000 New Yorkers had permits in 2011, according to a New York Times analysis.)”
With that many applications pending, one might watch to see whether the New York Police Department falls under the same Justice Department scrutiny as did the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department, for having a backlog of applications that have not been processed. The Trace story refers to that situation, noting that the DOJ has taken legal action against the Sheriff’s Department for the foot-dragging.
Buried in the story, but also worth noting because it underscores a complaint which has surfaced across the country where mandatory training requirements are being adopted by anti-gun lawmakers in an effort to financially discourage people from applying for a carry permit/license or a so-called “permit-to-purchase” a firearm, is the cost of the mandatory training. According to The Trace, an instructor named Lance Dashefsky “estimates that in the last year he guided about 250 students through the process, who generally paid him around $700 each to complete all the required components.”
As reported by TGM recently, when Oregon attorney Tony Aiello, Jr., was arguing before the Oregon State Supreme Court against Measure 114, he told then justices he had taken a training course to comply with the gun control initiative’s permit-to-purchase training mandate, and it cost $200.
Across the Columbia River in Washington, authorities there are still putting together a course in preparation for a training requirement law taking effect in May 2027. There is not even an estimate on the cost of that course.
While gun ownership in New York may not be nearly as prevalent as it is in Oregon or Washington, The Trace article has demonstrated the interest by a growing number of Big Apple citizens to change that. It proves that when people can exercise a constitutional right, they will do it.
