S-2156-119
Read twice and referred to the Committee on the Judiciary.
Sponsored by Edward Markey (D-MA)
What it does
This bill would let the Justice Department award three-year grants to states that adopt or keep firearms licensing systems. To qualify, a state's system would need to require a license to buy, rent, or lease a firearm or buy ammunition, and to keep one while owning them. It would also require background checks, safety training for first-time applicants, dealer licensing, extreme risk protection order processes, surrender of firearms after a license is revoked, safe storage rules, sales reporting, and judicial review of license denials. It would authorize "such sums as may be necessary" in funding, with no set dollar amount.
Who benefits
States and local police departments that adopt or maintain licensing systems and receive grant funds to cover administration. Family members who fear a relative is a danger and would gain a formal process to petition for an extreme risk protection order. Communities and domestic violence victims, if licensing and surrender rules reduce firearm access by prohibited individuals, as supporters project. Licensed dealers in participating states may gain clearer, uniform transaction rules.
Who is hurt
Gun owners and prospective buyers in participating states, who would face license fees, training, interviews, reference letters, and renewal requirements to keep firearms or buy ammunition. Small and occasional sellers, who would need a dealer license at 10 or fewer firearms a year or any ammunition sales, and who would face inspections and record rules. Local police departments, which would become licensing authorities and may bear workload or costs beyond the grants. Federal taxpayers, who would fund an open-ended authorization. People denied or stripped of licenses, who would have to give up firearms and pursue judicial review.
Supporters argue
Supporters argue that licensing ties firearm access to a screening of suitability, and they point to research on permit-to-purchase laws, such as studies of Connecticut and Missouri, linking them to lower firearm homicide and suicide rates. They contend federal grants are voluntary, leave design choices to states, require judicial review of denials, and bar discriminatory denials. They add that safe storage and extreme risk order provisions target suicide and accidental shootings.
Opponents argue
Opponents argue that requiring a license to possess firearms and buy ammunition burdens a constitutional right, and that discretionary "suitability" determinations by local police chiefs invite uneven or arbitrary denials. They contend that fees, training, interviews, and delays fall hardest on lower-income and rural residents, and that the dealer threshold of 10 or fewer sales sweeps in hobbyists. They also cite the open-ended funding authorization and the pressure the grants put on states to adopt licensing and registration-like reporting.
Constitutional context
The Second Amendment as interpreted in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022) and United States v. Rahimi (2024) governs the state licensing systems this bill would incentivize. Bruen noted that "shall-issue" licensing is presumptively lawful but warned against discretionary or abusive regimes, and the status of ammunition licensing, discretionary suitability standards, and storage mandates is unresolved. Congress's Spending Clause power, limited by South Dakota v. Dole (1987), supports conditional grants, and the grants are voluntary, which avoids anti-commandeering problems under Printz v. United States (1997).
Checks and balances
The bill would give the Justice Department grant-making and reporting oversight and leave states to design and run licensing programs, while Congress controls the appropriation and courts would review licensing decisions and any Second Amendment challenges.
Historical precedent
Congress has used conditional grants to encourage state firearms policy before, such as the NICS Improvement Amendments Act of 2007 grants for submitting records to the background check system, but no federal law has funded state licensing of firearm ownership.