San Francisco Sheriff Apologizes for Letting Carry Permits Lapse

Before the Bruen decision struck down “may issue” carry permit regimes, San Francisco County had issued approximately zero concealed carry permits to residents. Things honestly haven’t gotten much better over the past three years. The San Francisco Sheriff’s Department didn’t issue its first carry permit until February, 2023, which was nine months after the Bruen decision came down. By the time of Bruen‘s first anniversary in June, 2023 Sheriff Paul Miyamoto had approved two other applications, while more than 100 others were pending. 

According to San Francisco Public Safety News, the sheriff’s office has now approved a total of 163 permit applications. These permits are only good for two years, though, which means that some applicants have had to renew their permits… and Sheriff Miyamoto is now admitting and apologizing for not processing those renewals before the permits expired. 

“We have ex­pe­ri­enced ad­min­is­tra­tive de­lays in pro­cess­ing re­newals and I take full re­spon­si­bil­ity for the Sher­if­f’s Of­fice fail­ure to process and re­new CCW per­mits, which re­sulted in some un­in­ten­tion­ally ex­pir­ing,” Miyamoto said in a state­ment.

“This should not have hap­pened.”

Some 43 ap­pli­ca­tions are cur­rently pend­ing, say of­fi­cials. With their per­mits no longer ac­tive ap­pli­cants have been de­prived of their right to carry their firearms with them.

I’ll give Miyamoto an ounce of credit for at least admitting the screw up and taking responsibility for it, but that does nothing to change the fact that more than one San Francisco resident has been deprived of their right to bear arms because his office has failed to process paperwork in time. 

Miyamoto blames staffing levels for the delays, which is the same excuse offered by Los Angeles County Sheriff Robert Luna when pressed to explain why many initial applicants were waiting a year or more to receive their permit. The county supervisors who set the budgets for Miyamoto and Luna’s departments may very well bear some culpability here, but the sheriffs also have a statutory obligation to approve or deny permits within 120 days of receiving the completed application for a license renewal. If that means shifting staff and re-allocating resources so that these applications are processed in a timely manner, then that’s what needs to happen. 

Unfortunately, while California law requires sheriffs to process these renewals within 120 days, there are no consequences for sheriffs who don’t comply with the statute. I suppose California Attorney General Rob Bonta could call out these sheriffs, but given his radical anti-gun ideology we’re more likely to see President Donald Trump ask Marjorie Taylor Greene to be his date to the next White House Correspondents Dinner. 

We may also see Second Amendment groups filed suit agains the sheriff for failing to process these applications in a timely manner, but by the time a hearing on a preliminary injunction is held Miyamoto could have approved (or denied) the renewal applications filed by the plaintiffs, which would render the case moot. 

The Civil Rights Division’s new Second Amendment Section, on the other hand, has already sued Luna over the LASD’s concealed carry delays, and might be able to get the wheels of justice to spin a little faster than an independent pro-Second Amendment organization. If nothing else, a DOJ investigation into the policies and practices of the SFSD could lead to a consent decree that gives the department no wiggle room to delay approving permit applications going forward.

A right delayed is a right denied, and that’s the real problem in Miyamoto’s department. San Franciscans who should be able to legally carry a gun for self-defense cannot; not because of an arrest or conviction or “red flag” order, but because the sheriff couldn’t process their paperwork in time. If Miyamoto (or, to be charitable, San Francisco supervisors) can get away with this, it will only encourage other municipalities that are extremely hostile to our Second Amendment rights to defund the licensing divisions responsible for processing carry applications and leave countless other  Americans without access to their right to bear arms. 

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

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