US judge says Texas can’t ban 18-, 20-year-olds carrying handguns

FORT WORTH, Texas — A federal court docket in Fort Worth on Thursday struck down a Texas prohibition that restricted adults underneath 21 from carrying handguns.

Texas regulation bars most 18- to 20-year-olds within the state from acquiring a license to hold a handgun or carrying a handgun for self-defense exterior their houses. Two plaintiffs, who fall inside that age vary, and the Firearms Policy Coalition Inc. filed a lawsuit towards the state to problem the statute.

“Based on the Second Amendment’s text, as informed by Founding-Era history and tradition, the Court concludes that the Second Amendment protects against this prohibition,” U.S. District Judge Mark Pittman wrote within the ruling.

The order won’t go into instant impact. Pittman stayed the ruling for 30 days pending enchantment.

The resolution comes simply three months after an 18-year-old gunman killed 19 kids and two lecturers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde within the deadliest faculty taking pictures in Texas.

The Firearms Policy Coalition filed the lawsuit in November 2021. It got here months after a legislative session during which lawmakers handed a regulation that enables Texans to hold handguns and not using a license or coaching, regardless of earlier guarantees from Republican leaders to handle gun security following the 2019 El Paso and Midland-Odessa mass shootings.

In the final 13 years, as firearms have turn into extra accessible within the state, Texas has had eight mass shootings.

Gov. Greg Abbott’s workplace didn’t instantly reply to a request for touch upon Thursday’s ruling.

This is a creating story; verify again for particulars.

This article initially appeared in The Texas Tribune at https://www.texastribune.org/2022/08/25/federal-court-texas-21-handguns/.

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