may-issue CCW

Uncategorized

“Massive Resistance” In Maryland

July 5, 2022 by 4 Comments

Many states were slow to respond to the Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board of Education holding that segregation by race was unconstitutional. You had massive resistance to the Supreme Court’s ruling throughout the South and the border states. Politicians were often the ringleaders of this opposition and the most vocal.

You are now seeing a similar “massive resistance” on the part of anti-rights politicians in may-issue states after Bruen. While some states such as New York have adopted laws that will make the implementation of this ruling difficult to the point of follow-on lawsuits, on the face of it they are complying. Then there are politicians like Maryland Comptroller Peter Franchot (D-MD) who is one of the leading candidates for governor.

Franchot does not even camouflage the fact that he would ignore a Supreme Court ruling if elected. He reminds me of another Democrat politician – the late Sen. Harry Byrd (D-VA). It was Byrd who coined the phrase “massive resistance”. Taking Byrd’s famous statement and reworking it for Franchot would not be hard.

If we can organize the Southern States for massive resistance to this order, I think that in time the rest of the country will realize that racial integration is not going to be accepted in the South.

All you have to do is replace “Southern States” and “South” with “may-issue states” along with “racial integration” with “shall-issue carry” and you have it.

Regardless of whether Peter Franchot is elected governor of Maryland or one of the other candidates is elected, the Article I, Sec. 9 of the Maryland Constitution requires the winner to take an oath swearing to uphold the Constitution of the United States. From what Franchot is saying, he makes clear he would willfully violate his oath of office once elected.

I fail to see any difference between a Franchot and a Byrd when it comes to upholding the Constitution of the United States. He may just as well be saying, “Gun Control Now, Gun Control Tomorrow, Gun Control Forever.”

UPDATE: It appears that virtually all the Democrats running for governor of Maryland would ignore the US Constitution and Supreme Court rulings.

Tom Perez, Wes Moore, Ashwani Jain, Doug Gansler, John King, and Jon Baron have all issued statements critical of Gov. Larry Hogan (R-MD) for following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Bruen.

Uncategorized

May-Issue Carry Leads To Corruption

August 7, 2020 by 3 Comments

I wrote about an investigation into the Santa Clara County (CA) Sheriff’s Office and Sheriff Laurie Smith back in June. NBC News Bay Area had started checking into just who was issued a carry permit. While the average person had about a 5.5% chance of getting it approved, if you were a big donor to the Smith re-election campaign your success rate skyrocketed to 79%. I noted at the time that the issue was still under investigation by the Santa Clara DA’s Office.

The District Attorney’s Office reported today that a grand jury has handed down indictments for felony bribery and conspiracy against four men including a captain in the Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Office, two attorneys, and a local business owner. A $90,000 “donation” was to be made to an independent campaign committee in exchange for 10-12 carry permits for employees of a security company.

From the DA’s press release on the case:

Captain James Jensen, attorney Christopher Schumb, attorney Harpaul Nahal, and business owner Michael Nichols are accused of conspiring with the CEO and a middle manager of AS Solution, Inc., an international security company, to offer a $90,000 bribe to obtain concealed firearms permits (CCW licenses) for the company’s executive protection agents. This all took place in 2018, while Sheriff Laurie Smith — who had the authority to grant the CCW licenses — was in a hard-fought race for reelection, both in the primary and general elections.

The defendants are expected to be arraigned on the charges August 31, 2020 at the Hall of Justice in San Jose. If convicted, the defendants could receive prison time.

The DA’s Office is continuing to investigate more crimes and other individuals related to the issuance of CCW licenses. “Our concern is not whether the Sheriff grants many or few CCW licenses, but whether they are being granted or denied for the wrong reasons,” District Attorney Jeff Rosen said. “CCW licenses should not be given out in exchange for campaign donations. They should not be for sale.”

The DA’s investigation began shortly after the general election in 2018, sparked by an inquiry from the Metro Silicon Valley weekly about executive security licensing and an extremely large campaign donation, which was reported in public filings. The investigation found that weeks after the scheme was hatched, the conspirators settled on a $90,000 “donation” in exchange for 10 to 12 CCW licenses. After submitting 7 CCW license applications to Jensen at a meeting, AS Solution manager Martin Nielsen donated the first half of that amount to the Santa Clara County Public Safety Alliance (“PSA”), an independent expenditure committee supporting Sheriff Smith. The $45,000 personal check, which Nielsen handed to the PSA’s assistant treasurer, Schumb, represented more than half of the funds raised by the PSA before the election that year. The second installment was forestalled by the DA investigation.

In addition to bribery, the indictment charges Jensen with conspiring with AS Solution employees to put false information in their CCW license applications. Jensen advised Nielsen to instruct AS Solution employees who were not residents of Santa Clara County to use local corporate addresses as their residence addresses in their applications.

Captain Jensen is currently the head of the Training and Compliance Division of the Sheriff’s Office according to their website. Among the things he oversees is the Regional Firearms Training Facility.

Christopher Schumb is listed as a 2020 SuperLawyer and is a top-rate general litigation attorney in San Jose. He was admitted to the California Bar in 1984. Harpaul Nahal is also in private practice in San Jose and was admitted to the California Bar in 2010.

Mike Nichols is president of The Gun Company and is also VP Operations for Nichols Manufacturing which machines parts for the aerospace, defense, and firearms industries. The company holds a 07 FFL according to both their website and BATFE records.

If California had shall-issue carry by law, there would have been no need to bribe a sheriff’s office for issuance of a carry permit. As it is here and in many other locations that have may-issue carry, who you are and how much of a campaign contribution you make is more important than whether you are an honest, law-abiding citizen.

Uncategorized

A Sign Of Things To Come?

February 20, 2019 by 5 Comments

Rogers et al v. Gurbir Grewal et al is a case from New Jersey that is a challenge to the state’s may-issue concealed carry law. It is currently on appeal to the Supreme Court seeking a writ of certiorari after the Third Circuit said New Jersey’s law met intermediate scrutiny.

In late January, the attorneys for New Jersey filed a waiver saying they didn’t intended to file a response to the petition for a writ of certiorari by Thomas Rogers and the New Jersey Association of Rifle and Pistol Clubs. This could be taken as a sign that New Jersey fully expected the Supreme Court to summarily deny the petition for a writ of certiorari.

As Guns.com reported earlier today, the Supreme Court has now issued an order requiring New Jersey to file a response by March 21st.

The Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs issued a release yesterday that said, in part:

Today, the U.S. Supreme Court required the State of New Jersey to file a brief in response to ANJRPC’s petition asking the High Court to hear its challenge to NJ’s carry laws. Under the Supreme Court’s order, the State of New Jersey is required to file papers by March 21, arguing why the High Court should not agree to hear ANJRPC’s appeal. NJ had previously ignored the appeal.


While the move is not a guarantee that the Supreme Court will agree to hear the appeal, the fact that the court is requiring NJ to take a position on ANJRPC’s request is significant, and signals that the court is not willing to take any action without first hearing from both sides.

The case has attracted a number of amicus briefs on behalf of Rogers and ANJRPC. These include briefs from the National African American Gun Association,  a number of law enforcement groups and state gun associations, the Second Amendment Foundation, the National Rifle Association, and the American Civil Rights Union. There is also an amicus brief in support of Rogers from the attorney generals and governors of 24 states which was organized by Arizona Attorney General Mark Brnovich.

As the petition for the writ notes, Mr. Rogers met all the requirements for a carry permit from the state of New Jersey with the exception of showing a direct threat to his life. He has been robbed at gun point and manages an ATM service company which, by definition, involves large amounts of cash. Police in Wall Township, NJ agreed he met the training eligibility requirements but “he failed to show Justifiable Need.”

One can only hope that this move by the Supreme Court is a positive sign and that they will finally take up a carry case. This is especially true as there are diverging opinions between the circuits as well as a divergence in the proper level of scrutiny.