The Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division has accused Los Angeles County of denying people the right to concealed carry permits.
“The Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department has systematically denied thousands of law-abiding Californians their fundamental Second Amendment right to bear arms outside the home—not through outright refusal, but through a deliberate pattern of unconscionable delay that renders this constitutional right meaningless in practice,” according to the lawsuit.
The lawsuit claims the county forces citizens to wait 281 days, over nine months, “to begin processing their applications, with some waiting as long as 1,030 days (nearly three years).”
“These delays far exceed California’s own statutory requirement that licensing authorities provide initial determinations within 90 days, demonstrating Defendants’ flagrant disregard for both state law and constitutional obligations,” the lawsuit adds.
The division discovered “[A]s of May 2025, approximately 2,768 applications for new licenses remain pending, with interviews scheduled as late as November 2026—more than two years after some applications were first submitted. Numerous applicants simply gave up and withdrew their applications, often after waiting months in Defendants’ deliberately stalled process.”
During that time, the stats show the county issued two licenses and denied two.
Absolutely insane.
The division cites the Supreme Court 2022 division in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, where the justices state that “the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect an individual’s right to carry a handgun for self defense outside the home.”
“It is important to clarify that the LASD’s CCW Unit has been issuing permits at a significantly increased rate, contrary to the statistics and information cited by the Department of Justice in its complaint,” claimed LA sheriff spokesperson Nicole Nishida.
The Second Amendment is not hard to interpret: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”
Get it, LA County? Shall NOT be infringed. There’s a period after the word infringed. There’s no “except” or “but.”
You shall not infringe our natural right to bear arms.
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