New York City Mayor Eric Adams signed a new law making Times Square a gun-free zone despite a federal judge finding the state-level law saying the same thing unconstitutional.
From The New York Post:
“Today we enshrine in law that Times Square is a gun-free zone. Licensed gun carriers and others may not enter this area with a gun unless otherwise specifically authorized by law, but we’re not stopping here,” said Adams during a press conference alongside Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg and other elected officials.
Adams said the tourists should not “live in fear or distrust that someone is walking around with a gun ready to harm them.”
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said: “It is plain, good old common sense that no one should have a gun in Times Square.”
It’s infuriating that these people still think criminals will abide by these laws. Criminals do not care. In fact, it might embolden them because they know few people will have a gun on them.
Federal Judge Glenn Saddaby blocked the part of the state law banning guns in Times Square and other “sensitive” locations:
Based on the historical analogues located thus far, it does not appear permissible for New York State to restrict concealed carry in the following place: “the area commonly known as Times Square, as such area is determined and identified by the city of New York; provided such area shall be clearly and conspicuously identified with signage” (as stated in subsection “2(t) of the CCIA). Granted, one might argue that historical statutes banning the carrying of guns in “fairs or markets” are analogous to this prohibition. However, thus far, only two such statutes have been located.42 Setting aside the fact that the first one appears to apply only to carrying a gun offensively (“in terror of the Country”), and the fact that the second one appears to depend on royal reign, as stated before, two statues do not make a tradition.
“Although historical analogues certainly exist prohibiting carrying firearms in specific places, no historical analogues have been provided prohibiting carrying firearms virtually everywhere, as the CCIA does,” Suddaby concluded.
The law stays in effect because of a motion filed by New York State Attorney Letitia James.
Stephen Louis, Executive & Chief of the Legal Counsel Division, NYC Law Department, said the city would continue to enforce the New York gun law as they’re “waiting on an appeal while the attorney general has begun the appeal process to the Second Circuit.”
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