Michigan’s punitive law that generally requires individuals who do not possess a Michigan Concealed Pistol License to obtain a government-issued License to Purchase (“LTP”) before they can buy, possess, carry, or transport a pistol is the topic of a new lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan.
On June 14, the National Rifle Association, Michigan Coalition for Responsible Gun Owners, Michigan Gun Owners, Michigan Open Carry, and four NRA members filed Moser v. Nessel — naming Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel as the lead defendant — challenging the Great Lakes State’s firearm license-to-purchase and registration regime.
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit are seeking to have the firearm registration statutes declared unconstitutional under the Second and Fourteenth Amendments. They are also asking the court to permanently block enforcement of the law and order the destruction of firearm ownership records collected under the registration scheme.
Michigan doesn’t just require a permit — it builds a state firearms registry
The law not only requires people who do not possess a Michigan Concealed Pistol License to obtain a government-issued License to Purchase (“LTP”) before they may purchase, possess, carry, or transport a pistol, but also requires transaction records to be submitted to government authorities for entry into a statewide database maintained by the Michigan State Police.
That database functions as a de facto state firearms registry — exactly the kind of government tracking system gun-rights advocates have been fighting at the federal level for decades, replicated at the state level under the cover of “licensing” requirements. Michigan’s LTP regime has been on the books since 1927, and the registration component has drawn gun-rights opposition for decades. The lawsuit comes alongside parallel legislative efforts by Michigan Republicans to establish constitutional carry in the state, attacking the broader framework on two fronts simultaneously.
The lawsuit invokes Bruen against Michigan’s regime
According to a news item on the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action’s website, the complaint argues that Michigan’s LTP regime violates the Second Amendment under the Supreme Court’s text-and-history test set forth in the landmark Bruen case. In that ruling, the court held that firearm regulations must be consistent with the nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation and that licensing schemes cannot be administered in an abusive or discretionary manner.
“The Second Amendment guarantees ‘the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,'” the complaint states. “The Second Amendment is fully applicable to the States through the Fourteenth Amendment. The Second Amendment protects the right to acquire and possess arms in common use, such as handguns. The state laws — including Michigan’s LTP requirement — and local government actions challenged herein infringe those rights and thus violate the Second and Fourteenth Amendments.”
Michigan can’t justify its regime, and the plaintiffs know it
The complaint further argues that the state cannot justify its requirements:
“Plaintiffs’ acquisition, possession and receipt of pistols and other covered firearms for lawful purposes, including self-defense, is protected conduct, guaranteed against infringement by the Second Amendment. The challenged statutory scheme thus implicates the right to keep and bear arms, shifting the burden to the Defendants to justify their LTP regime. This they cannot do.”
In fact, according to NRA-ILA, the regime forces law-abiding citizens to obtain a redundant government-issued permit before exercising a constitutional right, even though federal law already requires background checks for firearm purchases from licensed dealers. It also authorizes denials based on subjective predictions of future dangerousness and lacks meaningful procedural safeguards or a statutory appeals process, resulting in arbitrary and inconsistent outcomes across jurisdictions.
The plaintiffs want the registry records destroyed
Ultimately, plaintiffs are asking the court to declare the statutes unconstitutional under the Second and Fourteenth Amendments, permanently enjoin law enforcement from enforcing any of the law, and order defendants to expunge, delete, or destroy all firearm ownership records obtained pursuant to the law that pertain to the individual plaintiffs and to those members of the organizational plaintiffs.
It’s all nothing more than More Blantant Discrimination. Discrimination that clearly singles out those trying to exercise a Constitutional Right. And as long as those in courtrooms and legislatures fail to label it Blantant Discrimination there is really nothing to stop Gun Control.
It’s only twenty-seven words long for this very reason.
“It’s only twenty-seven words long for this very reason.”
The founders weren’t perfect. The Second Amendment should read, “The Right of The People to keep and bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed.”
“It’s only twenty-seven words long for this very reason.”
The founders weren’t perfect. The Second Amendment should read, “The Right of The People to keep and bear Arms Shall Not Be Infringed.”
No preamble/justification.
It’s a literal jim crow law.
First enacted in 1927 following racist outrage that a black man, Dr. Ossian Sweet, had successfully claimed self defense against a white Lynch mob attempting to attack his family for the crime of moving into the wrong neighborhood. I wrote an article about Dr. Sweet for TTAG that anybody can find if they search for it.
The intent was to make it so that certain “undesirables” would essentially be blocked from legally obtaining pistols even if they had done nothing wrong.
The law was rolled back slightly in the early 2010s so that people could obtain the permit from any police dept rather than the one which covered where they lived, in addition to removing the requirements for a person to get the permit before buying a pistol from a dealer, though the defacto registration remained.
In 2024, democrats expanded it to include long guns(curiously leaving out frames and receivers) and re-instituted the requirement to obtain the permit when buying from a dealer.
Yes, its that time of year again – its ‘Juneteenth’, June 19 2026 when this is posted. (I research and post this somewhere every year, this year its here at TTAG. I just think its a really weird thing.)
Weird Juneteenth correlation (using an aggregate of various government sources and archives and news media and historical records) [updated with new information and for years 2025 and 2026]:
In 1853 the 13th Amendment abolishing slavery became part of the constitution – 100% of republicans vote in favor of it, 77% of democrats voted against it – it would take another 15 years after that for all slaves to be informed they were free people as the Democrat slave owners and Democrat politicians did everything they could to keep that from happening and it took another two years of over coming that resistance from democrats for them to actually let all slaves go so 15 + 2 = 17 years and during that 2 years time 7% of slaves that were still held died due to the humane conditions imposed on them by their democrat slave masters.
Although there were slave owners during that era that were ‘republican’ in political orientation, 77% of of slave owners were ‘democrats’ in political orientation (and 7% of these slave owners were Black).
Juneteenth was established as a federal holiday on June 17, 2021, when Biden signed the bill into law, but he had originally wanted to sign it on June 15 because he got the dates confused (no big surprise there). For some reason there were 15 different ‘final’ drafts of the bill before it was presented in Congress, but, it took another two days for the last final ‘final draft’ to be approved so 15 + 2 = 17.
Juneteenth marks the emancipation of enslaved African Americans, specifically marking June 19, 1865 when the last enslaved people in Texas were informed of their freedom. On June 17, 2021, Biden signed the bill into law. After Biden signed the bill into law, on June 19th 2021 while away from the white house his staff had to tell him he had already signed the Juneteenth bill because he had forgotten about it and 7 days later Biden asked an aid if the Juneteenth bill was ready for his signature.
After the bill was signed into law:
In 2021 (after the bill was signed into law)…. during the rest of that year ~77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and their victims voted Democrat.
In 2022 ~77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and the victims voted Democrat. The average number of elections (including local, state, and federal) these groups (collectively – the criminals and the victims) had voted democrat was 15.
In 2023 ~ 77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and their victims voted Democrat. The average number of elections (including local, state, and federal) these groups (collectively – the criminals and the victims) had voted democrat was 15.
In 2024 ~ 77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and their victims voted Democrat. The average number of elections (including local, state, and federal) these groups (collectively – the criminals and the victims) had voted democrat was 15.
In 2025 ~ 77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and their victims voted Democrat. The average number of elections (including local, state, and federal) these groups (collectively – the criminals and the victims) had voted democrat was 17.
In 2026 ~ 77% of black people that were victims of crime (all types, including misdemeanors), the perpetrators of the crime were black people who voted Democrat and their victims voted Democrat. The average number of elections (including local, state, and federal) these groups (collectively – the criminals and the victims) had voted democrat was 17.
In 2023, 2024, 2025, and 2026 ~17% of violent felony and misdemeanor criminal perpetrators were black trans (male > female) and another ~7% were black trans (non-binary) and another ~7% were black trans (female > male)
Juneteenth is a day that Democrat politicians like to use to virtue signal to pretend they were not and are not the party of racism and the KKK and Jim Crow, history and actions show otherwise – but virtue signal to pretend they do. ~77% of democrat politicians do this virtue signaling on Juneteenth. The SPLC funded hate and terrorism group ANTIFA members carried out 777 criminal assaults nation wide on black people between June 17th and June 19th in 2025 with some of their members being caught and citing ‘around Juneteenth’ as their target date to attempt to start a race-war (one of the long term stated goals of ANTIFA) – It did not get a lot of coverage like ANTIFA likes but 7 left wing news outlets (collectively) did ‘mention’ the assaults indirectly 7 days after June 19 on June 26th but issued retractions and corrections on June 27th to remove references indicating ANTIFA with a 7 word notation of “this story was updated to correct inaccuracies” and 7 days after that the stories were removed from their web sites.
The weird Juneteenth correlation is the number ‘7’.
correction for : “…and during that 2 years time 7% of slaves that were still held died due to the humane conditions imposed on them by their democrat slave masters.”
“humane” should have been “inhumane”
correction for: “…during that 2 years time 7% of slaves that were still held died due to the humane conditions imposed on them by their democrat slave masters. …”
“humane” should have been “inhumane”
The last part about eliminating the registry is tenuous at best. Multiple states have registries and they do not violate federal law, nor is their any constitutional provision prohibiting them. None have been successfully challenged. The only exception I know of was that the California registry was such a mess that the courts held that it could not be used as evidence to support a seizure warrant. That basically had to do with the fact that even when a notice of transfer is filed, the prior ownership record is never amended or purged.
Mark N.,
“… the California registry was such a mess that the courts held that it could not be used as evidence to support a seizure warrant. That basically had to do with the fact that even when a notice of transfer is filed, the prior ownership record is never amended or purged.”
I believe the very same thing is happening in Michigan.
What’s with that flag?
An elk and a moose holding a sign for an eagle to sit on then a banner with a bunch of words I can’t make sense of and underneath it all the word Circumcise.
They should have Bob Barker holding a cat and a dog instead of a moose and an elk.
Maybe people have pet moose’s and elks?
Spay away from me Edward Scissorhands.
Nothing is unjust when
its constitutional Privileges.
Xdduly Elected Official,
Ha ha, the word at the bottom is Circumspice, not Circumcise.
Anyhow, the words at the bottom are Latin and say something like, “If you seek a pleasant peninsula, look around.”
That’s great, now sue New Jersey for requiring the same.