Ninth Circuit Upholds California Gun Store Surveillance Requirement

George Orwell’s 1984 was supposed to serve as a warning, not an instruction manual. Still, in a world where Flock exists as a company, including its many other “services,” it’s clear that a lot of people didn’t get the freaking message.

And California is, unsurprisingly, one of the biggest offenders.

See, they don’t just let Flock cameras exist, but they also mandate surveillance at the local gun store. That’s scary, and it’s a system ready for abuse. It seems obvious to anyone who cares to look. Unless, of course, they’re a judge on the Ninth Circus.

Federally licensed firearm dealers in California will still need to maintain a surveillance system after a Ninth Circuit panel ruled in favor of the state on Thursday.

The plaintiffs, private licensed firearm dealers who operate out of storefronts and home businesses, say a state law passed in 2023 requiring the surveillance systems is a violation of their First, Fourth and Fifth amendments. The law, California Penal Code Section 26806, requires the firearm dealers to maintain 24-hour video and audio surveillance systems on their business premises.

The plaintiffs described the surveillance system requirement as a government-mandated eavesdropping device. The plaintiffs argued the surveillance systems violated their rights regardless of whether the state ever viewed the recordings.

A federal judge in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California dismissed the plaintiffs’ complaint for failure to state a claim in January 2025. In a 2-1 decision authored by U.S. Circuit Judge Lucy Koh, the Ninth Circuit affirmed the ruling.

Beginning with the plaintiffs’ Fourth Amendment claims, Koh, a Joe Biden appointee, found the California law did not violate the constitutional rights in the plaintiffs’ complaint.

“The panel rejected plaintiffs’ contention that a search occurs the moment that a federally licensed firearm dealer’s recording system begins to record any audiovisual data,” Koh wrote. “Plaintiffs failed to state a cognizable claim that Section 26806 violates the Fourth Amendment because plaintiffs failed to allege any physical intrusion or access of recordings by the state and failed to allege that mere compliance with Section 26806’s requirements transforms federally licensed firearm dealers into state actors.”

In other words, because the video stays in one place, rather than being collected, even sporadically, by authorities, it’s not a Fourth Amendment violation.

I think I see the reasoning, too. Because it’s just there, but kept on premises, it’s not really useable by the state in any manner unless they come in to look, and periodic inspections aren’t enough to trigger this because they’re not looking at who is buying, just that the system works. 

I think.

For what it’s worth, I think the court is missing the bigger picture here. The issue is that because all of this surveillance is mandated, anyone who steps into a gun store or a FFL’s home where he or she conducts business is automatically recorded by a system and into a format the state can demand at any time.

In other words, it’s a record of everyone who darkened a gun store’s doorway. Considering how Flock cameras work, too, that’s a terrifying combination, and one that would be handy as part of any gun confiscation scheme.

If the Ninth Circuit can’t see that, I don’t know what to say.

Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

Help us continue to report on and expose the Democrats’ gun-grabbing schemes. Join Bearing Arms VIP and use promo code FIGHT to receive 60% off your membership.