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Open carry was observed and uncontroversial at the NRA Annual Meeting in Atlanta in 2025. It was a bit more common at the NRA Annual Meeting in Atlanta in 2017, as documented in AmmoLand News then. Georgia passed Constitutional Carry (permitless carry) in 2022. Permitless carry applies to all lawful weapons carriers, as defined in Georgia code 16-11-125.1.(2.1) “Lawful weapons carrier” means any person who is licensed or eligible for a license pursuant to Code Section 16-11-129 and who is not otherwise prohibited by law from possessing a weapon or long gun, any resident of any other state who would...

BURLINGTON, Vt. — The FBI says an arrest has been made in connection to the fatal shooting death of a U.S. Border Patrol agent who was from Minnesota. On Friday, FBI Albany announced a 21-year-old woman from Washington state, Teresa Youngblut, was arrested in David "Chris" Maland's death in Vermont. The U.S. Attorney's Office in Vermont has since charged Youngblut with assault on a federal law enforcement officer. "Our hearts remain with our partners at U.S. Border Patrol Swanton Sector as they mourn this tremendous loss," the FBI said. Maland, who was born in Blue Earth, Minnesota, was killed Monday...

The FBI announced the arrest of a suspect Friday in the killing of U.S. Border Patrol Agent David "Chris" Maland near the Vermont-Canada border. Washington state resident Teresa Youngblut, 21, was taken into custody following the fatal shooting on Monday, according to the FBI’s office in Albany, N.Y. "The United States Attorney’s Office District of Vermont has charged Youngblut with assault on a federal law enforcement officer," it said. "Our hearts remain with our partners at U.S. Border Patrol Swanton Sector as they mourn this tremendous loss."

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis just hinted at the possibility of open carry legislation coming before Florida lawmakers in the upcoming 2025 legislative session. In an interview with radio host Bob Rose on Nov. 4, Rose brought up his preference for open carry, the wearing or carrying of a firearm in a visible manner, over other potential legislative initiatives, specifically referencing Amendment 3 – a recently proposed ballot measure to legalize recreational marijuana that failed to pass. “I’d much rather have open carry than weed, but that’s just me, governor,” Rose said. In response, DeSantis hinted that open carry could indeed...

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...

Generally, it’s best to go about one’s business as unobtrusively as possible, relying on situational awareness and solid knowledge of use of force law to avoid ever having to draw or fire one’s handgun. Among the perennial controversies in the firearm world is whether concealed or open carry is best. Circa 2024, open carry is widely allowed: State laws regarding open carry fall into several categories: permissive, permissive with restrictions, licensed open carry states, and those in which open carry is prohibited. Permissive states allow non-prohibited citizens to open carry without requiring a permit or license. Most states fall into...

FIRST ON FOX - A New York judge ordered the state to pay nearly half a million dollars in legal feels to the National Rifle Association (NRA) after the gun rights group won a major case at the Supreme Court. In a case decided last summer, the Supreme Court ruled that a New York public carry licensing law was unconstitutional and that the ability to carry a pistol in public was a constitutional right guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The NRA was a party in that case, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, and last week a...

The Idaho 4th of July Parade Live from Boise has rescinded an addendum to the parade entry rules that was sent to participants yesterday. Idaho Dispatch broke the story late last night that an email had been sent to all parade participants with an attachment that contained an addendum. The addendum said that participants were not allowed to open carry firearms or weapons in the parade. The email instructed the representative of the entry to agree and sign the addendum and return the form via email. You can see the story here: Breaking: Boise Independence Day Parade Bans Open Carry...

On May 24, 2023, a three-judge panel of the District Court of Appeal of the State of Florida, Fourth District, which includes Broward County, found the circuit court judge, Michael I. Rothschild, to have egregiously misread Florida law. The three-judge panel, consisting of judges Artua, Ciklin and Conner, unanimously found loading and openly carrying a firearm in a person’s own yard is not use of deadly force and is protected conduct under both Florida law and the Second Amendment of the US Constitution. Richard Burns engaged in a verbal confrontation with a five-man tree-cutting crew in his front yard. A...

During the spring of 2023, J’den McAdory, in Maryland, has been openly carrying a long gun in protest over Governor (D) Moore’s push for infringements on Second Amendment rights.For weeks, maybe months, people ignored J’den’s protests. WBALTV interviewed McAdory, and then the governor responded and called McAdory’s brave protests an “act of cowardice.” Whatever else is true, for a young man to stand against the entire state apparatus in Maryland and assert his First and Second Amendment rights is not the act of a coward.From wbaltv video :The man, J’den McAdory, told the I-Team on Thursday he’s protesting the governor’s...

Image Courtesy Dean Weingarten On Friday, April 14, at the first day of the NRA Annual Meeting in Indianapolis in 2023, this correspondent rode the shuttle from the Gate Ten parking lot to the Indiana Convention Center. A passenger was openly carrying what appears to be one of the Springfield XD series of pistols in a thumb-break outside the waistband holster. Notice the clip on the right front pants pocket. It is almost certainly attached to the ubiquitous folding pocket knife. The gentleman was perfectly willing to have this picture taken of him openly carrying. His comment was to the...

Alongside the amendment, many Republican lawmakers have opposed adding an open carry amendment to the legislation, with Senate President Kathleen Passidomo saying she does not support open carry because the Florida Sheriffs Association (FSA) is against it. “Republicans are showing their true colors on restoring our Second Amendment rights here in Florida. Whether it’s repealing gun free zones that only put innocent people in danger, or having the guts to pass Open Carry, they are failing miserably.” GOA Florida State Director Luis Valdes told the DCNF.

Less than 24 hours after a GOP lawmaker filed an amendment to gun legislation that could potentially allow open carrying of firearms in Florida it has been withdrawn, disappointing Second Amendment advocates. That leaves the gun legislation, a permitless carry bill, to proceed to a vote before the full Florida House of Representatives later this week. That bill, HB 543, would repeal the requirement that Floridians who carry a concealed weapon must get a license through the state. It would also mean Floridians would not have to take a gun safety and training course. Luis Valdes, the state director of...

Gun Owners of America’s Florida director Luis Valdes figured the best way to find out what DeSantis thinks about open carry is to ask him directly. So Valdes bought a copy of the Governor’s new book and stood in line for two hours at a book-signing event in Jacksonville. As DeSantis was signing the book for Valdes, he asked him about open carry. When asked if he he supports open carry and would like to see it added to the permitless carry bills, DeSantis said . . . Yeah, absolutely. I don’t think [the Legislature] are gonna do it, but...

The Chief Rabbi of the Israel Police penned an open letter on Tuesday addressed to rabbis throughout Israel urging them to advise their congregants to carry legal and licensed firearms on Shabbat. In his letter, Rabbi Rami Brachyahu said that this measure was necessary in the wake of the recent terrorist attack in the Jerusalem neighborhood of Neve Yaakov in which seven people were murdered outside of a synagogue where most did not carry arms because of the Shabbat.. “We are learning that the religious neighborhoods and synagogues can serve as an extensive target for terrorist acts,” he wrote. “This...

On January 16, Monday, after coming back from the Industry Day at the Range, before the opening of the SHOT Show on Tuesday, this correspondent was outside in Las Vegas, on Tropicana Avenue, in front of Liquor World, taking a few pictures. The weather was cool, but not cold. It was overcast, without rain. A young black man drove up in a late model sporty car, parked, got out, and entered the store with an openly carried pistol stuck in his waistband. As a writer for AmmoLand, this correspondent knew he had to take action. This correspondent formulated a hasty...

In the recent Supreme Court decision of NYSR&PA v. Bruen, the court ruled the proper way to determine restraints on the exercise of Second Amendment rights was to review history and see if restraints on those rights had been widely accepted across the American polities, especially at the time of the ratification of the Second Amendment in 1791 and the ratification of the Fourteenth Amendment in 1868, as the Second Amendment has been applied to the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. The right to bear (carry) arms for the protection of self and others has long been a part of...

On May 27, 2022, at Clay’s Wellston Food Market in Missouri, next to the Illinois border on the east side of St. Louis, a man “openly carrying” an AR15 type rifle, under a jacket, with a “gun sleeve” on the rifle, was accosted by an armed man who approached him from behind and demanded the rifle and the jacket. From ksdk.com: Major Ron Martin with the North County Police Cooperative spoke to 5 On Your Side after the shooting. He said that moments before the shooting, a customer with a rifle had entered the grocery store.Martin said the patron was...

Open Carry at Church, Equipped with AR-15 and Radio, image by Dean Weingarten U.S.A. –-(AmmoLand.com)- In the law of self-defense of almost all states, If a person is attacked, and reasonably fears for their life, they may legally defend themselves with deadly force. A small minority of states require a person to retreat from the situation if they can do so in complete safety.In all states of which I am aware, a person may not use deadly force in self-defense, if they provoked the attack with the intent of using deadly force.It is not legal to start a fight so...

Joy Behar told her co-hosts Wednesday on ABC’s “The View” that “the Supreme Court is poised to pass a bill,” making New York State an open-carry state, seeming to confuse the legislative and judicial branches of the U.S. government. Behar referenced the Supreme Court potentially ruling to overturn a New York 1913 gun control law that limits the ability to legally carry a concealed gun in public spaces.