Judge: Illinois’ Concealed Carry Ban on Public Transportation Violates Second Amendment

A U.S. District Judge ruled Friday that Illinois’ ban prohibiting concealed carry for self-defense on public transportation violates the Second Amendment.

The judge, Ian D. Johnston, issued his opinion in Schoenthal v. Raoul. 

The plaintiffs in the case, Benjamin Schoenthal, Mark Wroblewski, Joseph Vesel, and Douglas Winston, all claimed the ban violated the Second Amendment.

Schoenthal, Wrogblewski, Vesel, and Winston’s case was supported by the Second Amendment Foundation and the Firearms Policy Coalition.

Judge Johnston noted:

In Illinois, openly carrying firearms is unlawful. Under the Firearm Concealed Carry Act, an individual with a concealed-carry license may generally carry a concealed handgun in public….This general permission, however, does not extend to a list of prohibited areas, including public transportation.

He then pointed to Bruen (2022), noting that it set forward a framework by which gun controls must be analyzed and tested.

Johnston pointed to opinions by Kimberly Foxx, State’s Attorney of Cook County, who argued in support  of the ban. He then noted that “Finally, and decisively, whatever is true elsewhere in the law, Ms. Foxx’s proposed framework contradicts Bruen, which rejects the relevance of place to the threshold question of whether certain conduct is covered by the Second Amendment.”

He ultimately ruled that “the Firearm Concealed Carry Act’s ban on carrying concealed firearms on public transportation, as defined in the statute…violates the Second Amendment,” as applied to the plaintiffs.

Second Amendment Foundation founder and executive vice president Alan Gottlieb commented on the ruling, calling it a “significant victory” in which “the court recognized Cook County Attorney Foxx’s argument that the ban was legal because Illinois is acting as a property owner was ‘breathtaking, jaw dropping and eyepopping,’ and that wasn’t a compliment. It demonstrates how far government will reach in an attempt to justify its effort to restrict Second Amendment rights.”

AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio, a member of Gun Owners of America, a Pulsar Night Vision pro-staffer, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly: awrhawkins@breitbart.com.