According to the Weirton Daily Times a West Virginia judge has ruled that an anti-gun-rights lawsuit may proceed:
A federal judge said Wednesday a lawsuit brought by an organization representing domestic violence victims challenging a 2018 law prohibiting businesses from banning guns from parking lots can move forward.
This is all about House Bill 4187, the Business Liability Protection Act. The bill and related lawsuit have been going on for a few years now:
The bill, which was passed by the West Virginia Legislature on March 10, 2018, and went into effect 90 days later, prohibits property owners or lessees of real property from prohibiting gun owners from possessing their firearms in their parked vehicles. It also prohibits the hiring or firing of employees based on their possession of firearms.
The Coalition Against Domestic Violence filed its lawsuit a year later, alleging the law violates the property rights of the coalition and its 14 affiliates across the state and puts its clients in potential danger.
You will be unsurprised to hear the aforementioned Coalition Against Domestic Violence isn’t quite as altruistic as the name suggests. The group’s lawsuit is being pushed and represented by none other than Everytown Law, the litigation arm of Michael Bloomberg’s Everytown for Gun Safety civilian disarmament advocacy operation.
Then there’s this quote from Everytown Law:
“Under the law in question, private property owners can’t choose to keep guns off their property, no matter what their reasons are,” said Eric Tirschwell, managing director for Everytown Law. “It’s truly extreme, and it directly affects our clients’ ability to protect their staff, residents and visitors.”
This is where I wander off into the domestic violence weeds for a moment. DV isn’t something to be taken lightly and it’s a topic we’ve touched on before here on TTAG, with a mixed bag of results. My bottom line, as it always has been, is that victims of domestic violence are best served by learning to defend their own lives. That means owning and training with firearms. You are responsible for your own safety. No one is coming to save you.
The idea Everytown’s Tirschwell is pushing that a law that doesn’t allow business owners or lot owners to ban firearms from a parking lot endangers domestic violence victims is nothing short of ludicrous. A parking lot is a high-risk area for an attack, especially when you’re being stalked and harassed. Apparently Tirschwell is under the impression a person actively engaging in criminal, violent behavior will be dissuaded from an attack by a business saying they can’t have a gun in a parking lot.
It’s disappointing to see a domestic violence group actively advocating to make places more dangerous for victims. These are the actions that get people killed.
One can hope the original bill stands when the dust settles but it seems to be on shaky ground.