DOJ sues Maryland county over sweeping public-carry restrictions

The Justice Department sued Montgomery County, Maryland, on Monday, arguing the county’s ordinance restricting where licensed gun owners may carry firearms — including in and near churches and synagogues — violates the Second Amendment.

The suit, filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland, targets Expedited Bill 23-26, which County Executive Marc Elrich signed into law July 27. The county passed the measure after the Maryland Supreme Court’s April 28 decision in Engage Armament v. Montgomery County, which upheld the county’s authority to bar carrying firearms in or within 100 yards of parks, places of worship, schools, libraries, recreational facilities, exhibition facilities, polling places, courthouses and legislative assemblies. The court rejected the county’s attempt to extend that authority to hospitals, health centers, long-term care and child care facilities, and other government buildings, and ruled that applying the ban to permit holders traveling on public highways exceeded the county’s local-law authority. Bill 23-26 dropped the disallowed categories and added an exception for permit holders passing through on public roads.

Those remaining restrictions — the ones the Maryland court upheld — are what the DOJ is now challenging on federal constitutional grounds. The department’s complaint alleges the ordinance violates the Second Amendment by prohibiting law-abiding citizens from possessing firearms in daily life, according to a Justice Department press release. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the department’s Civil Rights Division, said the exclusion zones make it “almost impossible for a law-abiding citizen with a valid carry license to walk down the street” without breaking the law. 

The department argues that the ordinance conflicts with the Supreme Court’s reasoning in Wolford v. Lopez, which in June invalidated Hawaii’s default rule barring licensed carry on private property open to the public unless the owner expressly authorized it. Wolford did not directly decide whether houses of worship, parks or 100-yard buffer zones qualify as sensitive places, but the DOJ contends its reasoning about ordinary daily activity applies with equal force to Montgomery County’s buffer zones.

In its own litigation filing, the government estimated the restricted locations cover at least 10,000 parcels spanning more than 7,900 acres — over a quarter of the county — before the 100-yard buffers are even factored in, according to court documents cited by JNS. The filing states the exclusion zone makes it “almost impossible for a citizen to walk through town to shop, to dine” without repeatedly entering it.

The DOJ’s suit follows a formal warning letter the department’s Civil Rights Division sent county officials July 30, demanding written confirmation by noon that day that the county would not enforce the law against houses of worship, or face a lawsuit “without further notice,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General R. Jonas Geissler wrote.

The suit also follows a related challenge from a Silver Spring synagogue. The Silver Spring Jewish Center and Rabbi J. Menashe Shapiro sued the county Thursday in the same federal court, seeking a temporary restraining order or preliminary injunction, according to the case’s federal docket. The complaint alleges the ordinance would bar the synagogue’s volunteer security team and congregants from carrying firearms, including on the walk to and from services.

A spokeswoman for Montgomery County told the Daily Caller the county does not comment on pending litigation.

Houses of worship have periodically been the target of deadly violence, including the 2018 Tree of Life synagogue shooting in Pittsburgh and the 2015 Charleston church shooting. In a 2019 attack at a Texas church, gunman Keith Thomas Kinnunen shot and killed two congregants before Jack Wilson, head of the church’s volunteer security team, fatally shot him.