October 1st brought Florida a welcome break from the summer heat and relief from local gun control laws for over 7 million Florida gun owners. We welcomed both the first cold front of Fall and the effective date of our Firearms Preemption Enforceability Law.
The hypocrisy of some city, county, university, and agency politicians and bureaucrats in the months leading up to now has been staggering! We have seen grandstanding, false information, fear mongering, unreasonable indignation, political spin, and blatant violations of the law from people who swore an oath to uphold the laws of this state. I guess we know how good their word is if they can’t even abide by their solemn oath or refrain from committing crimes themselves.
Florida Carry will be filing lawsuits in the coming days, the first of which may be as early as this afternoon. Of course the soon-to-be defendants in our cases are doing ALMOST everything they can to stay off our litigation list. But they fall short of doing the one thing that can help them… Respect state law.
All they have to do is repeal and remove their firearms and weapon laws, rules, regulations, signs, etc…
Get out of the gun control lobby’s pocket and do your agency’s primary job. Then you have nothing to worry about. Attempt to ban or criminalize otherwise lawful possession of firearms or other weapons, we’ll see you in court. And then we’ll take your money and your job.
790.33 (3) PROHIBITIONS; PENALTIES.—
(a) Any person, county, agency, municipality, district, or other entity that violates the Legislature’s occupation of the whole field of regulation of firearms and ammunition, as declared in subsection (1), by enacting or causing to be enforced any local ordinance or administrative rule or regulation impinging upon such exclusive occupation of the field shall be liable as set forth herein.
(b) If any county, city, town, or other local government violates this section, the court shall declare the improper ordinance, regulation, or rule invalid and issue a permanent injunction against the local government prohibiting it from enforcing such ordinance, regulation, or rule. It is no defense that in enacting the ordinance, regulation, or rule the local government was acting in good faith or upon advice of counsel.
(c) If the court determines that a violation was knowing and willful, the court shall assess a civil fine of up to $5,000 against the elected or appointed local government official or officials or administrative agency head under whose jurisdiction the violation occurred.
(d) Except as required by applicable law, public funds may not be used to defend or reimburse the unlawful conduct of any person found to have knowingly and willfully violated this section.
(e) A knowing and willful violation of any provision of this section by a person acting in an official capacity for any entity enacting or causing to be enforced a local ordinance or administrative rule or regulation prohibited under paragraph (a) or otherwise under color of law shall be cause for termination of employment or contract or removal from office by the Governor.
(f) A person or an organization whose membership is adversely affected by any ordinance, regulation, measure, directive, rule, enactment, order, or policy promulgated or caused to be enforced in violation of this section may file suit against any county, agency, municipality, district, or other entity in any court of this state having jurisdiction over any defendant to the suit for declaratory and injunctive relief and for actual damages, as limited herein, caused by the violation. A court shall award the prevailing plaintiff in any such suit:
1. Reasonable attorney’s fees and costs in accordance with the laws of this state, including a contingency fee multiplier, as authorized by law; and
2. The actual damages incurred, but not more than $100,000.
