The Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) joined others Thursday in a suit against Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker (R) over his refusal to allow gun stores to remain open as essential business during the coronavirus shutdown.
On April 3, 2020, Breitbart News reported Baker was keeping gun stores closed despite Trump administration guidelines labeling the retail outlets as “essential.”
SAF joined the Firearms Policy Coalition; Commonwealth Second Amendment, Inc. (Comm2A); the Massachusetts Gun Owners Action League (GOAL); plus retailers and private citizens in a suit against Baker.
The suit is McCarthy v. Baker and is filed in the United States District Court for the District of Massachusetts.
SAF’s Alan Gottlieb commented on the action, saying:
Closing gun stores and preventing citizens from exercising their Second Amendment rights is not the way to fight a viral pandemic. How ironic that rights groups must take the governor of Massachusetts to court over a Second Amendment issue as the 245th anniversary of the Battles of Lexington and Concord approaches. Government gun control is precisely the reason our ancestors stood together on April 19, 1775, and the Baker administration should seriously re-think its position.
Gottlieb added, “State and local governments cannot suspend the Constitution and its guarantee of fundamental human 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. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.