CALIFORNIA DOJ WITHDRAWS REGULATION REQUIRING REGISTRATION OF ‘ASSAULT WEAPONS’

[Sedalia Dave]

CALIFORNIA DOJ WITHDRAWS REGULATION REQUIRING REGISTRATION OF ‘ASSAULT WEAPONS’

 

 

Quote

 

The California Department of Justice withdrew a regulation Wednesday evening requiring California firearm owners to register so-called “assault weapons” following a lawsuit filed by a group of gun rights advocacy organizations including Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC), Firearms Policy Foundation (FPF), Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), The Calguns Foundation (CGF) and California Association of Federal Firearms Licensees (CAL-FFL).

“The DOJ’s proposed rule making in this case was a smoke-screen to cover their tracks and other prior unlawful regulatory actions,” said FPC President Brandon Combs in a statement. “While we are pleased that our opposition efforts were ultimately successful here, we know that Attorney General Becerra is relentless in his attacks on law-abiding gun owners and their Second Amendment rights. FPC will continue to defend the people of California and our Constitution from his DOJ’s abusive executive actions.”

The lawsuit was filed, SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb said in a previous statement, because of California DOJ’s Firearms Application Reporting System (CFARS) breaking down during the deadline week for people to register their firearms in accordance with new state laws.

“For a whole week the system was largely inaccessible, so people who wanted to comply with the law simply couldn’t and now they face becoming criminals because they couldn’t do what the law requires,” said Gottlieb.

 

 

[Nickel City Dude]

Now if we can only get rid of the NY(un)SAFE act in NY things will be rosey for us,

[Blackwater 53393]

This is just ONE brick in California's wall of onerous and un-constitutional legislation!!  

 

I feel kinda' like Ronald Regan standing next to the Berlin Wall!!  "Misters and Mistresses Supreme Court Justices, TEAR DOWN THIS WALL!!!"

[Subdeacon Joe]

Hot damn!  I missed that!  Now there are only about 45 single spaced, 10 point font pages to get them to withdraw.

GREAT NEWS, Thanks for posting.

[Dantankerous]

Wow!

 

But what exactly are they replacing this with?

 

[Subdeacon Joe]

10 hours ago, Dantankerous said:

Wow!

 

But what exactly are they replacing this with?

 

 

We won't know until the day before the deadline. 

[Nickel City Dude]

49 minutes ago, Subdeacon Joe said:

 

We won't know until the day before the deadline. 

Hasen't the deadline already passed?

[Subdeacon Joe]

17 hours ago, Dantankerous said:

Wow!

 

But what exactly are they replacing this with?

 

 

7 hours ago, Subdeacon Joe said:

 

We won't know until the day before the deadline. 

 

6 hours ago, Nickel City Dude said:

Hasen't the deadline already passed?

Let's take things in order.   
Dantakerous asked what the (withdrawn) law (regulation with all the force of law) would be replaced with.  
Given the history of the CA DOJ on the law by bureaucratic fiat about firearms of all sort - made in secret and withheld from review and released at the last moment - I responded that we wouldn't know what draconian, Byzantine dreck CA would come out with until the day before whatever deadline for registration, modification, destruction would hit.

Now, to your question, yes, the deadline for registration had passed.  Which resulted in Sharp v. Becerra  being filed against Becerra and the CA DOJ.  Text of which is HERE  only 36 pages, of which the last 5 or 6 are basically signatures and boiler plate.  Well worth reading.  

In part:

 

Quote

1. Since 1989, the State of California has regulated the acquisition, possession, and use of firearms using an ever-expanding definition of so-called “assault weapons” and by and through an aggressive enforcement of an ever-expanding statutory scheme. In 2016, the State once again broadened the “assault weapons” statutes to include more semi-automatic firearms with a magazine locking device, colloquially known as “bullet buttons.”1

2. The possession, transportation, and use of unregistered “assault weapons” carries criminal liability to otherwise law-abiding citizens, in addition to the potential loss of their property, fines, and standing in the community. Thus, many law-abiding California citizens, desiring to abide by the laws of our State, have opted to comply with the laws and register their eligible firearms so as to remain in good standing with the law.

3. But many law-abiding gun owners, including the Individual Plaintiffs and many members of the Institutional Plaintiffs here, have been denied their right and ability to register such eligible firearms in accordance with the registration mandates of Penal Code §§ 30680 and 30900(b) because Defendants Attorney General Xavier Becerra and the California Department of Justice (DOJ) have utterly failed and refused in their statutorily-imposed duties to the People of the State of California to establish a properly functioning Internet-based system for processing the registration of such firearms. The system that DOJ has set up and maintained, the California Firearms Application Reporting System (CFARS), was known by Defendants to be flawed, intermittently inoperable, and ultimately incapable of providing a reliable means for the public to register their firearms in accordance with the law.

4. Things came to an ignominious conclusion the week before the statutory registration deadline. During the week of Monday, June 25, 2018, through Saturday, June 30, 2018, the statutory deadline, and beyond, the DOJ’s registration system was largely inaccessible, and inoperable on a wide variety of ordinary web browsers across the state. Users who were able to access the site were prevented from completing the process before the Internet-based registration system crashed, obliterating the hours-long progress they had made. As a result, many individuals, including the individual plaintiffs herein, were prevented from timely registering before July 1 in compliance with the law due to no fault of their own.

5. In this case, Plaintiffs seek an un-extraordinary result, compelled by the basic tenets of due process: That they simply be allowed to register their eligible firearms and comply with the law, and that the Attorney General, the DOJ, and their officers and agents similarly comply with the law by allowing such registrations and ensuring they are properly and timely processed through a functioning online database as they have been required by statute to do.

6. Plaintiffs seek mandamus, declaratory and injunctive relief as necessary and proper to remedy the DOJ’s failures to permit and provide for a functional registration system throughout the registration period, including and especially during the last week of June 2018.

.....

18. Individual Plaintiffs Sharp, Ajirogi, and Gilardy are bringing this claim on behalf of themselves, and as representatives of a class of similar individuals consisting of law-abiding California residents too numerous to individually name or include as parties to this action. These are: California citizens who are not otherwise prohibited or exempt under the “assault weapon” registration laws, and who lawfully and legally possessed firearms that the State of California has retroactively classified as “assault weapons” under Penal Code § 30515(a) that must be registered as such pursuant to Penal Code sections 30680 and 30900(b), but who have been precluded from doing so due to the inaccessibility and/or non-functionality of the DOJ’s CFARS system during the week of June 25, 2018 and continuing through the registration deadline of June 30, 2018..

Boils down to the CA DOJ failing in its responsibility to provide adequate and reliable means of registration throughout the entire registration period.  Plaintiffs were, through no fault of their own, in the last week of the registration period, unable to complete the process of registering their "assault rifles" as regulations required.  This lawsuit prompted the CA DOJ, likely in order to avoid (thanks Hardpan) having the law voided in court, withdrew the required registration.  

Now we are waiting to find out what draconian measures Becerra and the CA DOJ will try to implement next.

[Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967]

Joe, do you mean "likely in order to AVOID having the law voided in court?"  

 

And you're right.  Undoubtedly someone got reamed hard on the software side.  They'll be back.  Meaner'n nastier'n ever.  

[Subdeacon Joe]

3 hours ago, Hardpan Curmudgeon SASS #8967 said:

Joe, do you mean "likely in order to AVOID having the law voided in court?"  

 

And you're right.  Undoubtedly someone got reamed hard on the software side.  They'll be back.  Meaner'n nastier'n ever.  

 

 

Yep.  And I rewrote that section 3 times!

 

In the words of Justin Wilson, "I gaur-on-teee!"