SACRAMENTO, CA (June 30, 2022) – Last night, Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) sent a letter to California Attorney General Rob Bonta informing him that if local concealed-carry issuing agencies use the state’s so-called “good moral character” requirement in the way he recently called for in response to NYSRPA v. Bruen, it will cause them “to defend far more Second Amendment claims than they have ever faced.” The letter can be viewed at FPCLegal.org.

“Conditioning a carry license on a discretionary evaluation of an applicant’s ‘good moral character’ is patently inconsistent with Bruen’s repeated statements that the carry right may not be denied by non-objective criteria applied by a local government official,” says the letter by attorney Bradly Benbrook of Benbrook Law Group. “Bruen considered and rejected New York’s ‘proper cause’ requirement for a carry license, but it left no doubt that it was the discretionary aspect of the licensing regime—requiring citizens to convince a government official that they deserved a license based on their circumstances—that fell outside the historical tradition of permissible firearm regulation.”

“It has never been clearer that these laws trample people’s rights,” said FPC Policy Counsel Matthew Larosiere. “Both Bruen and the command of the Second Amendment are clear: government agents don’t get to decide on a piecemeal basis who does and does not get to enjoy their fundamental rights. It is my sincere hope that Bonta sees the writing on the wall and abandons his aggressive encroachments against the rights of Californians, lest the federal courts have to, once again, show him his place.”

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Firearms Policy Coalition (firearmspolicy.org), a 501(c)4 nonprofit organization, exists to create a world of maximal human liberty, defend constitutional rights, advance individual liberty, and restore freedom. FPC’s efforts are focused on the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and adjacent issues including freedom of speech, due process, unlawful searches and seizures, separation of powers, asset forfeitures, privacy, encryption, and limited government. The FPC team are next-generation advocates working to achieve the Organization’s strategic objectives through litigation, research, scholarly publications, amicus briefing, legislative and regulatory action, grassroots activism, education, outreach, and other programs. FPC Law (FPCLaw.org) is the nation’s first and largest public interest legal team focused on the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, and the leader in the Second Amendment litigation and research space.