A gun rights group, along with individual gun owners and retailers, is challenging the state’s 1998 assault weapon ban in federal court, arguing the law unconstitutionally infringes on the right to bear arms and improperly bans an entire class of weapons.
The lawsuit, filed Monday by a group of plaintiffs including the Gun Owners Action League, names as defendants Gov. Charlie Baker, Attorney General Maura Healey, Public Safety Secretary Daniel Bennett, the Massachusetts State Police and State Police Superintendent Col. Richard McKeon.
Healey said Tuesday she would “vigorously defend” the law in court and that her office has been successful defending against Second Amendment challenges in the past.
“This has never been about grabbing guns from people,” Healey said on WGBH Radio. “My actions have never been about taking away guns from people. I respect the Second Amendment, but we have a law on the books, and it’s an important law. It says that civilians can’t walk around with or be in possession of military-style assault weapons, weapons that were made for military use to kill as many people as possible as quickly as possible. That’s appropriate. The Legislature’s able to do that, and I believe that they acted wisely.”
The complaint argues that between the assault weapon ban and Healey’s crackdown last summer on copies or duplicates of forbidden guns, “Massachusetts effectively bans the acquisition of the most popular rifles in the nation,” along with standard-capacity magazines that are “sold with nearly all semiautomatic firearms across the nation.”
GOAL has vigorously opposed Healey’s July 20, 2016 announcement that her office’s enforcement of the assault weapons ban would also include copies or duplicates of banned guns.
“It’s been a long struggle since July,” GOAL executive director Jim Wallace told the News Service. “Our laws were bad enough here in Massachusetts and tough enough to understand … and then suddenly, when we think we had it all figured out, on July 20, we were told we didn’t.”
Healey has said that assault weapons were the “weapons of choice for mass shooters” and that manufacturers had evaded the state ban by making minor tweaks to banned guns.
A Healey spokeswoman said sales of illegal assault weapons have ended in the state since the enforcement notice was issued.
“This new lawsuit, the second challenge by the gun lobby, seeks to overturn this 20-year old law,” spokeswoman Jillian Fennimore said in a statement. “We will vigorously defend the law and continue our enforcement efforts to protect the people of our state.”