California “Sensitive Places” Law Blocked—Again

California’s off-again, on-again new law banning carry for concealed carry permit holders in more than two dozen locations is off again.

As many TTAG readers likely recall, on Dec. 20, U.S. District Judge Cormac Carney granted a preliminary injunction blocking the “sensitive places” portion of the state’s new carry law. At the time, Judge Carney called the law “repugnant.”

“Although the government may have some valid safety concerns, legislation regulating [concealed carry] permit holders—the most responsible of law-abiding citizens seeking to exercise their Second Amendment rights—seems an odd and misguided place to focus to address those safety concerns,” Carney wrote in his ruling.

Just 10 days later, however, a three-judge panel of the 9^th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals put Carney’s injunction on hold pending further review by that circuit court.

“The district court’s preliminary injunction issued on December 20, 2023, is temporarily stayed pending resolution of the motion for a stay pending appeal by the merits panel,” the court wrote. “In granting an administrative stay, we do not intend to constrain the merits panel’s consideration of the merits of these appeals in any way.”

On Saturday, however, a last-minute appeal by the California Rifle & Pistol Association (CRPA) resulted in the 9^th Circuit court lifting the stay on the district court’s earlier injunction, once again blocking the law from being enforced.

“The emergency motion under Circuit Rule 27-3 for a stay pending appeal and for an interim administrative stay, the supplements, responses, and replies thereto, have been referred to the merits panel and the case is calendared for argument in April,” the court wrote. “The administrative stay previously entered is dissolved.”

The law would have banned permit holders from carrying concealed firearms in 26 different places, including churches, banks, hospitals and on public transportation.

In the Dec. 20 District court ruling, Judge Carney had said the state completely failed in its arguments that the law meets the second Bruen standard—whether it was consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.

“Given the nation’s history and tradition of protecting the core right to carry a firearm to those wishing to defend themselves and their families in case of confrontation, it is unsurprising that the government does not offer a single historical prohibition on carrying firearms at hospitals or medical offices, much less one limiting carry by a category of people that is particularly responsible and trained and whom the government has background checked,” Judge Carney wrote. “And the government has presented no evidence that this balance supports preventing people who have been through a thorough background check and training process to obtain a special permit to carry a concealed weapon from exercising their constitutional right to self-defense on public transportation.”

With the latest ruling, that part of the law will remain blocked until the 9^th Circuit rules on the merits of the case sometime in the future.