Attorney General Pam Bondi (R.) wants Pennsylvania sheriffs to issue concealed carry permits to qualified non-residents.
In a letter to Pennsylvania Attorney General David Sunday (R.) and Pennsylvania Sheriffs Association president Sean Kilkenny (D.), Bondi argued some sheriffs’ refusal to issue the permits violates non-residents’ gun rights. She warned the practice could lead the Department of Justice (DOJ) to intervene.
“This practice is unlawful under Pennsylvania law,” Bondi wrote last month. “It also raises serious concerns under the Second Amendment, which guarantees the right to bear arms in public, as well as the Privileges and Immunities Clause, which prohibits discriminating against out-of-state citizens by denying them the exercise of fundamental rights.”
The move is the latest effort from the DOJ to force localities to adopt gun policies they’ve championed. It comes after the Department announced an investigation into the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department’s carry permit processing practices. The letter also boosts gun-rights activists’ push to open up the gun-carry permitting process in Pennsylvania.
“I commend Attorney General Pam Bondi’s defense of Second Amendment rights for non-residents seeking Pennsylvania Licenses to Carry Firearms, a right denied by some county sheriffs,” Val Finnell, Gun Owners of America’s Pennsylvania director, told The Reload. “All Pennsylvania sheriffs must issue these licenses to qualified applicants, preventing the need for permit’ shopping.'”
The issue stems from how Pennsylvania licenses gun carry. Pennsylvanians can apply for permits where they live, and county sheriffs must issue a permit to them if they pass the required background check. Non-residents with a permit from their home state are also eligible to go through the same process under state law, but many county sheriffs don’t accept applications from those living out of state.
That means non-residents who want to legally carry in Pennsylvania have to search around for a sheriff who will accept their application. That can be difficult, especially in some of the most populous parts of the state. For instance, Bondi claimed only one county in the Philadelphia area–Delaware County–issues non-resident permits.
“The practice of refusing to accept applications is especially pernicious because there are no specified legal remedies for the bare refusal to entertain an application,” Bondi wrote. “In other states that operate under the Uniform Firearms Act, citizens have sought and obtained writs of mandamus to compel local licensing agencies to carry out their ministerial duty to entertain a license application. Nonresidents should not have to do that in Pennsylvania.”
Bondi warned Sunday and Kilkenny that the DOJ takes a dim view of the practice and believes it may violate the Constitution.
“But this is not merely a state-law problem,” she wrote. “The Supreme Court has been clear that ‘[t]he constitutional right to bear arms in public for self-defense is not a second-class right, subject to an entirely different body of rules than the other Bill of Rights guarantees.’ A permit requirement for public carry does not, without more, violate the Second Amendment.”
Bondi noted the Supreme Court ruled subjective may issue permitting regimes unconstitutional in 2022’s New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen. She argued the situation with non-resident permits is similar.
“What is happening in Pennsylvania is even worse,” Bondi wrote. “Although citizens retain their right to armed self-defense when they cross state lines, Pennsylvania sheriffs are ignoring state law to deny carry licenses on a categorical basis, not merely a discretionary one, as in Bruen.”
She said the fact that Pennsylvania has the kind of shall-issue permitting law blessed by the Court in Bruen doesn’t protect it from a potential challenge.
“The Supreme Court has warned that ‘any permitting scheme’ —even a shall-issue regime–can be put toward abusive ends’ that ‘deny ordinary citizens their right to public carry.’ That is exactly what is happening across the Commonwealth,” Bondi wrote. “Moreover, because the categorical refusal to issue licenses specifically targets out-of-state residents, these policies are also suspect under the Privileges and Immunities Clause, which guarantees that ‘[t]he Citizens of each State shall be entitled to all Privileges and Immunities of Citizens in the several States.'”
Bondi ended her letter by requesting cooperation from the Attorney General and the Sheriffs Association.
“I would appreciate your help resolving this situation promptly on a statewide basis and without the need for litigation,” she wrote. “The Department of Justice will be monitoring the situation closely. ”
Neither the Pennsylvania Attorney General’s Office nor the Sheriffs Association responded to a request for comment.
