#2445 The Empire Strikes Back Against NYSRPA v. Bruen: What Attorneys Needs to Know About Changes to Firearms Law

Presented on July 27, 2022

1.0 CLE credit: Areas of Professional Practice (appropriate for all attorneys)

The Second Amendment has been a source of extensive controversy since the Sullivan Act was passed in 1911, creating New York’s handgun licensing schema, with the initial intention being to restrict Italian-American immigrants from lawfully possessing handguns. Regardless of one’s personal opinion of the right to keep and bear arms, along with what the appropriate contours of that right should be, it is beyond debate that New York has one of the most restrictive and punitive series of gun laws in the United States.

In July 2022, after having called an Extraordinary Session of the New York Legislature, Governor Kathy Hochul signed the Concealed Carry Improvement Act of 2022 (“CCIA”) which brought sweeping changes to New York’s gun laws that are, by any measure, greater in scope than those codified in 2013 under the New York Secure Ammunition and Firearms Enforcement Act (“NY (the “SAFE Act”) of 2013. Governor Hochul did not propose and sign these changes into law in a vacuum. Just weeks prior to the CCIA, the United States Supreme Court struck down portions of the New York pistol permit law that required pistol permit applicants to establish “proper cause” to obtain a license to carry a handgun (“pistol permit” or “firearms license”). More importantly, the Supreme Court adopted a standard of review applicable to all Second Amendment challenges to state gun laws that place virtually all new state gun control restrictions in doubt. Hence, the Empire State “struck back” against the Supreme Court’s decision.

Critics of Governor Hochul’s Concealed Carry Improvement Act believe that the law clearly violates the literal standard set forth in Bruen. At the time of this CLE, numerous lawsuits have been filed against the CCIA, with many legal experts believing that significant portions of the law will be enjoined. Given New York’s historical traditions standard, meaningful injunctions against the law would not come as a surprise. This CLE, however, is intended to provide attorneys with the background of the law as it stands today. Given the fluid nature of events, these materials will be updated and with the possibility of a follow-up CLE in the event an injunction is issued against any portion of the CCIA.

Moderator: Erin Tresmond, Esq., Co-Chair, Appellate Practice Committee

Speaker: Maximillian Tresmond, Esq., Tresmond & Tresmond, LLP

Available format: OnDemand

OnDemand: $40 members (Promo Code: member 2017), $50 Non-members