The NRA has sued New York Governor Andrew Cuomo over the state’s refusal to classify gun stores as essential businesses during the coronavirus outbreak.
NRA: “Pointless and Arbitrary Attack” on the Second Amendment
On March 20th, Cuomo designated only pharmacies, liquor stores, grocery stores and take-out restaurants as essential businesses during the coronavirus pandemic, ensuring other shops had to close. The NRA described this decision as a “pointless and arbitrary attack on the constitutional rights of New York citizens and residents,” arguing that Governor Cuomo “indefinitely suspended a key component of the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution.”
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This is the second suit that the NRA have launched against a governor for shutting down gun stores during the coronavirus outbreak. The NRA launched a similar suit last week against Gavin Newsom, the Governor of California, for creating a similar executive order.
“Municipalities who target lawful gun stores for closure aren’t promoting safety—by weaponizing their politics to disarm you and your loved ones, these shameless partisans are recklessly promoting a gun-control agenda that suffocates your self-defense rights when you need them most,” said Jason Ouimet, the executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action.
Gun Sales Skyrocket In Spite of Store Closures
Another lawsuit was launched by the New Jersey Second Amendment Society and the Legend Firearms shop against New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy after he also deemed gun stores as non-essential businesses.
“The exigencies surrounding this viral pandemic both justify and necessitate changes in the manner in which people live their lives and conduct their daily business,” the lawsuit read. “However, this emergency (like any other emergency) has its constitutional limits. It would not justify a prior restraint on speech, nor a suspension of the right to vote. Just the same, it does not justify a ban on obtaining guns and ammunition.”
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Murphy claimed that he had “gotten not one complaint from anybody that they were trying to buy a gun and they couldn’t,” yet gun sales have spiked up 83%, with handgun sales soaring over 91% since governors have started ordering quarantines and lockdowns due to the coronavirus outbreak. Hopefully the NRA suits will succeed and show these executive orders for what they are – a thinly veiled attempt to crush the Second Amendment!