A Federal District Judge in Connecticut upheld the state’s firearm restriction that prevents people under 21 from getting a handgun permit.
The lawsuit, Succow v. Bondi, was initiated by two 19-year-old residents of Connecticut, Zachary Succow and Samuel Towne. Succow and Towne, and two nonprofits that joined the lawsuit—the Connecticut Defense League and the Second Amendment Foundation—argue it is unconstitutional to prohibit adults between the ages of 18 and 20 from transferring, purchasing, selling, and/or carrying handguns. In their complaint, the plaintiffs said the prohibition violated both their Second and Fourteenth Amendment rights.
Judge Sarala Nagala, a 2021 Biden nominee, rejected the Plaintiffs’ claims on July 23 after a two-day bench trial, where facts were presented directly to her. In her decision, she found “that the State and Federal Handgun Restrictions do not violate Plaintiffs’ Second Amendment or Fourteenth Amendment rights, as they are consistent with this Nation’s history and tradition of firearms regulation.”
Nagala reviewed both federal and state gun control legislation and registration processes to come to this conclusion. The attorneys representing the Plaintiffs say she looked at this the wrong way.
“The district court found no Founding Era support for the laws that stripped young adults of their constitutional rights,” a joint statement from the lead attorneys for the Plaintiffs, Cameron Atkinson, Craig Fishbein, and Doug Dubitsky, said. “That means, under U.S. Supreme Court precedent, the court should have ruled for the plaintiffs.”
“This is a major victory for commonsense gun safety and for Connecticut families,” said Attorney General William Tong in a press release. “The court rejected another radical challenge to dismantle Connecticut’s gun safety laws and affirmed what we’ve argued from the start. These age restrictions are constitutional, and they save lives. We will continue to fight the reckless attempts to weaken Connecticut’s gun safety protections.”
This isn’t the first gun regulation that has been challenged during Tong’s time in office. In the last two years, Second Amendment activists have tried to overturn bans on carrying guns in post offices and for self-defense in state parks. U.S. district judges in Connecticut upheld state regulations in both of those lawsuits. Both cases have the same plaintiff, David Nastri, and have since been appealed to the Second Circuit.
Atkinson, Fishbein and Dubitsky are not calling it quits. They said in their statement, “At this point, we are evaluating all options to restore the plaintiffs’ rights, including at the U.S. Supreme Court if necessary.”
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