Courts Once Again Side With Gun Owners Despite New York’s Post Bruen Moves

A judge has once again sided with gun owners in New York state, despite legislators’ best attempts to infringe upon New Yorkers’ Second Amendment rights.

Per a media release from the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), a firearms advocacy group:

A federal judge in western New York has granted a preliminary injunction against
enforcement of the “private property exclusion” tenet of the state’s new gun control law, calling it unconstitutional.
The case, known as Christian et. al. v. Nigrelli, et. al., was brought by the Second Amendment Foundation and Firearms Policy Coalition on behalf of Brett Christian, a private citizen. U.S. District Court Judge John L. Sinatra, Jr. with the U.S. District Court in Buffalo handed down the 27-page ruling.
Noting that the private property exclusion “makes it a felony for a license holder to possess a firearm on all private property, unless the relevant property holders actually permit such possession with a sign or by express consent,” Judge Sinatra noted, “Regulation in this area is permissible only if the government demonstrates that the current enactment is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of sufficiently analogous
regulations…New York fails that test.”
Judge Sinatra added, “Property owners indeed have the right to exclude. But the state may not unilaterally exercise that right and, thereby, interfere with the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens who seek to carry for self-defense outside of their own homes.”

After the Supreme Court’s decision in the National Rifle Association (NRA) backed NYSRPA v. Bruen case which affirmed the right to carry a firearm outside the home, New York Governor Kathy Hochul called legislators back to Albany for a special session to pass further gun control measures.

Those measures included enhanced permitting requirements such as a social media background check as well as a ban on carrying firearms in a list of prohibited venues including churches.

The ban on carrying in churches was also temporarily halted earlier this fall following another decision by Judge Sinatra.

Alan Gottlieb, SAF founder and executive vice president, shared that he was thrilled with this week’s ruling:

“New York’s efforts to dance around the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision have become a painful exercise in legal acrobatics, which it seems obvious the courts can see through,” Gottlieb observed. “This case illustrates the ridiculous lengths to which lawmakers in Albany have tried to go in their efforts to get around the letter and spirit of the high court ruling.”