The city of Philadelphia will allow residents to submit gun-carry permit applications by email after pro-gun advocates filed multiple lawsuits over delayed applications, The Washington Free Beacon reports.
"It's hard to imagine the Philadelphia defendants not running a new risk analysis after the [U.S. Supreme Court’s] Roman Catholic Diocese of Brooklyn v. Cuomo order," said Adam Kraut, the director of legal strategy for the Firearms Policy Coalition. "Anyone in their position would have to be concerned about how the Court would view their regulatory scheme."
Attorney Andrew Austin, who represented Gun Owners of America in its lawsuit against the state of Pennsylvania, added that the city is accepting emailed applications because of difficulties meeting its own deadline for allowing in-person applications.
"They were going to lose," Austin said. "I think what they wanted to do was just avoid [the judge] entering a judgment for GOA."
Kraut and Austin said that they are still looking to ensure a timely application process. The FPC will likely move forward with its federal case, and Austin plans to closely monitor the city to make sure it doesn’t try to find a loophole.
"Instead of making people wait to apply, they may now decide that maybe they can't comply in 45 days, which, again, the law is against," Austin said. "But it is Philadelphia, so they may try to do things that are wrong."
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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