Free Republic

Gun controls, including a semiautomatic firearms ban and ammunition controls, secured final passage in the Colorado legislature Friday and have been sent to Gov. Jared Polis’s (D) desk. On February 20, 2025, Breitbart News noted that the semiautomatic firearms ban had passed the Colorado Senate. In order to secure Gov. Polis’s support, Senate Democrats added language to the ban which allows gun purchasers to secure an exemption to the prohibition by going through a process similar to concealed carry permit vetting, then taking a “four-hour training course.” Would-be purchasers who do not have hunter safety certification will have to go...

New Mexico Democrats continue pushing a ban on semiautomatic firearms, couching the ban in the language of prohibiting gas-operated firearms. On February 7, 2025, Breitbart News reported that New Mexico Democrats had revived legislation Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham (D) wanted in 2023, and were pushing it as Senate Bill 279. On December 13, 2023, Breitbart News observed that Grisham wanted legislation modeled after Sen. Mark Kelly’s (D-AZ) Gas-Operated Semiautomatic Firearms Exclusion (GOSAFE) Act. Although GOSAFE failed passage at the federal level, Grisham believed it could be pushed through the New Mexico legislature by her fellow Democrats. SB 279 continues moving...

A ban on the most popular semiautomatic rifles and numerous shotguns has passed Colorado’s House and Senate and is heading to Gov. Jared Polis’s (D) desk. The Colorado Sun noted the bill passed in the Senate earlier this week on a 19-15 vote. The 19 votes supporting the ban were all cast by Democrats. On January 29, 2025, Breitbart News warned a ban on numerous semiautomatic firearms — rifles and shotguns — passed the Colorado Senate Affairs Committee and was headed to the Senate Floor.

A ban on numerous semiautomatic firearms — rifles and shotguns — passed the Colorado Senate Affairs Committee on Tuesday and is now headed to the Senate Floor. The legislation is SB25-003, which targets firearms state Democrats define as a “specified semiautomatic firearm.” SB25-003 says, in part: The bill defines a “specified semiautomatic firearm” as a semiautomatic rifle or semiautomatic shotgun with a detachable magazine or a gas-operated semiautomatic handgun with a detachable magazine. The bill prohibits knowingly manufacturing, distributing, transferring, selling, or purchasing a specified semiautomatic firearm; except that a person may transfer a specified semiautomatic firearm to an heir,...

The Petitions of the Week column highlights some of the cert petitions recently filed in the Supreme Court. A list of all petitions we’re watching is available here. The Supreme Court’s landmark 2022 gun-rights ruling in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, which held that laws restricting the right to bear arms are constitutional under the Second Amendment only if a tradition of such regulation can be found in U.S. history, triggered a wave of challenges to state firearms regulations across the country. This week, we highlight petitions that ask the court to consider, among other things,...

New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) signed a number of gun control bills on Wednesday, one of which requires licensed gun dealers to post signs warning would-be buyers about alleged dangers associated with firearms. Spectrum News 1 posted about the new law, which forces gun dealers’ signs to “[include] a paragraph explaining how guns in the home increase the risk of suicide, death during a domestic dispute or unintentional death to children.” The sign “must also include contact information for the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline.” North County Now noted five other gun controls were signed by Hochul, which do everything...

The Sri Lankan government has issued a gun confiscation directive requiring all people with firearms and a permit to possess them for self-defense to turn the firearms, ammunition, and permits they possess to the military authorities. The firearms must be surrendered by November 7, 2024. From dailynews.lk: The Ministry of Defense has decided to temporarily take back all firearms and ammunition issued to civilians for self defense.According to the powers vested on the Defense Secretary by Section 6 (1) and 6 (2) of the 1916 Firearms Act No. 33, these firearms and ammunition issued to civilians for self defense are...

An investigation is underway after an officer's gun accidentally went off and injured three people during the kick-off concert at the Reno Rodeo Wednesday night. A deputy with the Washoe County Sheriff's Office saw a physical domestic disturbance at the Reno-Sparks Livestock Events Center. While addressing the incident, one of the people involved in the domestic engaged in a physical altercation with the deputy. The Reno Police Department said that plain clothes officers who were working the Reno Rodeo concert responded to assist. Due to the large crowd, officers were unable to get through immediately. A responding officer jumped a...

Alec Baldwin was sloppy and reckless with firearms on the set of “Rust” before the fatal shooting of cinematographer Halyna Hutchins, prosecutors have contended. According to court documents obtained by ETonline, the 66-year-old leading man engaged in “horseplay” during firearm training, including one instance when he fired a blank round at a crew member, whom he’d been using to establish his line of sight. Prosecutors further alleged Baldwin was also “erratic and aggressive” during filming, contributing to safety concerns on set. Baldwin would also allegedly use his prop firearm as a pointer, relying on it to acknowledge and direct different...

As of Monday, it is no longer illegal in Hawaii to carry a dangerous weapon in public, and switchblade and butterfly knives are no longer banned. HONOLULU (HawaiiNewsNow) -- As of Monday, it is no longer illegal in Hawaii to carry a dangerous weapon in public -- and switchblade and butterfly knives are no longer banned. That change led to an alarming sight in Waikiki at sunset Tuesday. The governor signed HB 2342 into law Monday without fanfare, making it immediately legal to openly carry weapons that were banned in public until now. Gun rights activist Andrew Namiki Roberts, leader...

On Thursday a three-judge panel from the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit decided that Steven Duarte, a felon, has a “right to possess a firearm for self-defense.” Courthouse News Service noted Duarte has five felony convictions and was a member of a street gang in Los Angeles. The decision upholding Duarte’s gun rights was split, with George W. Bush appointee Carlos Bea and Donald Trump appointee Lawrence VanDyke deciding in the majority. Bea wrote the majority opinion, noted the panel tested the prohibition against felons possessing guns in light of Bruen (2022) and found the government...

Firearm-related crime is surging in heavily gun-controlled Canada, according to a report from Toronto Star contributor Shaquille Morgan. Morgan pointed to data from Canadian police, noting “there were 9,198 victims of gun-related crime” in Canada in 2022. The 2022 figures represented a ten percent jump in the rate of gun-related crime compared to 2021 and a 60 percent jump compared to 2013. Morgan zeroed in on handguns, explaining that “63 per cent of gun-related homicides were committed with a handgun.” Canada has stringent gun controls, and Morgan indicated they have gotten even more stringent during the past years. During that...

The Aloha State’s highest court upheld a man’s gun-carry conviction on Wednesday after rejecting landmark decisions from the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS). Hawaii’s Supreme Court reversed a lower court decision that found charges leveled against Christopher Wilson for carrying a gun without a permit violated his rights. Instead, the court ruled its state constitution provides no gun-rights protections whatsoever. That’s despite it including a provision protecting the right of the people to keep and bear arms identical to the one in the federal Constitution. “Article I, section 17 of the Hawaiʻi Constitution mirrors the Second Amendment to...

The proportion of registered Democrats who have a firearm in their home has jumped significantly over the past few years.. rising crime in urban areas could be behind the increase. In November 2023 the survey found 41 percent of Democrats said they live in a household with a gun, up from 33 percent in a similar survey .. in August 2019. Notably, 33 percent of Democrats also said they lived with a gun in a similar NBC survey conducted in March 2004, indicating the sharp rise has been concentrated over the past four years. ... The data also showed a...

Masked burglars struck actor Keanu Reeves’ Hollywood Hills home early Thursday, stealing a firearm and getting away before police could apprehend them. TMZ reported that police first went to Reeves’ home at 7:00 p.m. Wednesday in response to a trespass call, but did not locate anyone. Hours later–at 1:00 a.m. Thursday–an alarm at the property sounded and police went to the home again. This time they saw masked burglars on security footage, and a firearm had reportedly been stolen.

An armed security guard working at an Oakland, California, 7-Eleven was robbed at gunpoint in broad daylight Saturday in stringently gun-controlled California. The Daily Mail reported that the robbery occurred outside a 7-Eleven “in Oakland’s Grand Lake neighborhood” on Saturday afternoon. After taking the security guard’s gun and taser, the mob targeted a delivery truck from which they allegedly stole “tens of thousands of dollars worth of cigarettes.” CBS News quoted the 7-Eleven store owner saying, “It was scary, scary, and it was scary for the customers.”

This is the shocking moment a 17-year-old shot a 14-year-old dead on the streets of DC while his mother stood by and did nothing - before he was caught bragging about the shooting online. Surveillance footage shows the teen, believed to be Lorenzo Thompson, 17, in a black hoodie and balaclava raising a gun outside the Crown gas station at 14th and Euclid streets NW in Columbia Heights at about 11:30pm on November 3. The woman with red braids and wearing a white coat, believed to be Thompson's mother, watches on but does nothing to diffuse the situation.

A Tennessee woman fatally shot a “scared” 4-year-old girl — then claimed to cops she was only trying to give the child a “gun safety lesson,” authorities say. The suspect had allegedly hit the tot with a sandal right before for failing to wake the woman up and eating food without permission. Breanna Runions, 25, was charged with murder and aggravated child abuse after allegedly pushing the loaded gun into little Evangaline Gunter’s chest and pulling the trigger at a home in Rockwood on Sunday, WBIR reported. Runions, who was not the child’s mother, initially tried claiming to officers that...

Israel Ministry of Defense security personnel successfully apprehended a suspicious Palestinian vehicle at the Hotze Shomron Crossing this afternoon. Upon inspection of the vehicle, a firearm and several ammunition cartridges were discovered concealed within snack bags. The two Palestinian passengers and the seized weapons were transferred...

"In an unprecedented move, twenty armed Internal Revenue Service (IRS) and Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) agents carried out a raid on a gun store in Great Falls, Montana, seizing all Form 4473s – documents that record buyer’s information during firearms transactions."