Bill Banning Sale of Glocks on Glide Path to Gavin Newsom

Though gun control activists in California were handed a major defeat last week when the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals upheld a lower court decision that found the state’s background check requirement on ammunition sales unconstitutional, they’re hard at work trying to impose new restrictions on the right to keep and bear arms. Their next dubious achievement is likely to be a ban on the sale of Glock handguns in the state, with a bill already approved by the state’s lower chamber.

As CalMatters reports, AB 1127 is almost assured of Senate approval as well, and that could come in just a matter of weeks. The legislation wouldn’t prohibit the continued possession of legally-purchased Glocks, but it would force firearm dealers across the state to pull Glocks out of their inventory. 

The impetus for the ban is the use of “switches” that, once illegally installed, essentially convert semi-automatic handguns into full-auto machine pistols. Though these switches are already illegal under both state and federal law, backers of the Glock ban say the handguns themselves are an issue. 

The measure’s lead author, Assemblymember Jesse Gabriel, a Democrat representing the Encino area, told the Senate Judiciary Committee this month that if gun manufacturers don’t like the ban, they can redesign their weapons to make them less easy to convert to machine guns.

“Most handgun designs don’t have this issue, and this legislation is narrowly focused on a limited number of designs that are exceptionally easy to modify,” he said. “Sadly, certain actors in the gun industry have known about this issue for decades and have refused to do anything meaningful to address it.” 

Gun rights advocates say Glock has already redesigned new models to be incompatible with the switches, but the California Department of Justice hasn’t included those weapons on its list of handguns that can be purchased in the state. 

In other words, Gabriel’s either ignorant or dishonest when he says that Glock hasn’t done anything “meaningful” to address the issue. And while I don’t think a ban on older generations of Glocks is likely to withstand court scrutiny, the fact that Gabriel’s legislation doesn’t compel or require CalDOJ to put newer generations of Glocks on the state’s handgun roster makes it clear that this isn’t about preventing the use of illegal machine gun conversion devices. It’s about making it impossible to buy some of the most popular pistols in the country… and if it’s adopted in California it won’t be long before we see similar bills pushed in other blue states across the country. 

The bill poses an interesting political test for Gavin Newsom, who recently claimed that he’s not anti-gun at all, even though he’s never once vetoed a piece of gun control legislation. Newsom’s telegraphed his interest in running for president in 2028, but signing a Glock ban into law would be a glaring neon sign pointing to his anti-gun extremism. At the same time, Newsom risks losing support from the gun control lobby and tens of millions of dollars in campaign spending on his behalf if he doesn’t sign AB 1127 into law.

If Newsom does sign AB 1127 (as I suspect he will), the bill will face an immediate legal challenge, and California Attorney General Rob Bonta is going to have to get creative to defend the ban in court. Glocks are undoubtably protected by the Second Amendment, which means that Bonta will have to show that banning the sale of a particular model of handgun because it can be illegally converted into full-auto fits within the national tradition of gun ownership. 

Bonta will most likely point to 19th century bans on Bowie knives as an historical analogue. Second Amendment attorney and scholar Dave Kopel has shown, though, that outright prohibitions on possession of the knives were exceedingly rare… and in at least one case was ruled unconstitutional by a state Supreme Court. Bans on the concealed carry of Bowie knives were slightly more common (though still legal outliers) in the 1800s, but that’s not even remotely the same as banning their sale or possession entirely.  

Bonta might also try to argue that banning the sale of older generations of Glock is a response to “unprecedented societal concerns”, but violent crime has been a societal concern throughout the entirety of U.S. history. There were also plenty of technological advances in firearms in the 19th century that led to both an increase in a gun’s capacity and its rate of fire, but there was no widespread attempt to ban the sale of multi-shot revolvers, repeating rifles, or even precursors to machine guns like Gatling guns. 

There’s simply no national tradition of banning an arm protected by the Second Amendment because it can be illegally modified to shoot faster. That rationale could be used to ban almost every semi-automatic firearm in existence, even those that can’t be modified through the installation of a switch. California’s anti-gun lawmakers, though, have a knack for passing laws that flagrantly violate our Second Amendment right, and AB 1127 looks to continue that trend. 

Editor’s Note: The anti-gunners are intent on destroying our Second Amendment rights, and they don’t mind doing it one step at a time instead of in one fell swoop. 

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