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Ammoland Inc. Posted on April 28, 2020 by Jim Grant

While the SCOTUS shot down a recent challenge to handgun laws, this may open up an opportunity for an ANJRPC case.

U.S.A. -(AmmoLand.com)- April 28, 2020. Yesterday the U.S. Supreme Court decided that a long-pending NYC Second Amendment challenge was mooted by law changes made after the case was filed. The decision ends speculation that the High Court might use the NYC case to establish new rules applicable to all Second Amendment cases in the future. It also means that ANJRPC’s pending challenge to NJ’s unconstitutional carry law could be the next Second Amendment case to be heard by the Supreme Court.

ANJRPC’s carry law challenge has been “held” by the Supreme Court for many months, meaning that the High Court did not decline to hear the appeal, but did not agree to hear it either. It was speculated that the Court may have first wanted to create new general rules in the pending NYC case, before either hearing pending Second Amendment cases directly or sending them back down to the lower courts for decision under the new rules. Now that the NYC case has been found moot, new rules are no longer forthcoming anytime soon in that case, and the door has been opened to the possibility that the High Court will directly hear one of the pending Second Amendment cases it has been “holding.” That includes ANJRPC’s challenge to NJ’s unconstitutional carry law, which effectively prevents average citizens from exercising their right to defend themselves with firearms outside the home.

Roger J Katz (Towne Criour), Stephen L. D’Andrilli (Publius)

The U.S. Supreme Court just released its decision, April 27, 2020, in the New York “Gun Transport” case: New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc., vs. Petitioners V. City Of New York, 590 U.S ____ (2020), and it isn’t good. You can read the decision here on the SCOTUS website.

WHAT WAS THE NEW YORK CITY GUN TRANSPORT CASE ABOUT?

“Petitioners [NYSRPA] sought declaratory and injunctive relief against enforcement of the rule insofar as the rule prevented their transport of firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city. The District Court and the Court of Appeals rejected petitioners’ claim. See 883 F. 3d 45 (CA2 2018). We granted certiorari.  586 U. S. ___ (2019).  After we granted certiorari, the State of New York amended its firearm licensing statute, and the City amended the rule so that petitioners may now transport firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city, which is the precise relief that petitioners requested in the prayer for relief in their complaint.”

New York City changed its law, fearing the Supreme Court would find the law unconstitutional. The last thing anti-Second Amendment forces want is a high Court opinion that strengthens the Second Amendment. The City’s gambit paid off. In a 6 to 3 vote, the Supreme Court held that, since the City changed the old rule, the case is moot, because Petitioners can now lawfully transport their handgun to a second home or shooting range outside the City. But can they really? What will New York City do in the future to restrict the fundamental right of the people to keep and bear arms? This will almost certainly embolden New York City Mayor Bill DeBlasio and New York Governor Andrew Cuomo.

Cuomo has threatened to destroy the Second Amendment to the Nation many times in the past. In a previous AQ article, titled, “Andrew Cuomo Seeks To Impose New York’s Restrictive Gun Laws On The Entire Nation,” published on our site, on March 31, 2019, we pointed out that,

“In January of 2019 . . . Cuomo announced plans . . .  to increase gun control within the first 100 days of the new legislative session,’ and he chortled, ‘New York already has the strongest gun safety laws in the nation, and we are taking additional steps to make our laws even stronger and keep our communities, and our schools, safe. Together, we will pass this common sense legislation and send a clear message to Washington that gun violence has no place in our state or nation. . . .’ ‘[t]he rest of the country should take up legislation similar to the Safe Act gun control. . . . ’”

The high Court’s gun transport case decision gives Cuomo and others who seek to destroy the Second Amendment” confidence that the high Court will be doing nothing to rein them in.

HOW DID INDIVIDUAL JUSTICES VOTE?

As you may have suspected, the liberal wing of the Court, along with Chief Justice Roberts, voted in favor of the City, to dismiss the case. Justices Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch dissented.

Curiously and disturbingly, Trump’s second nominee to the high Court, Brett Kavanaugh, agreed with Chief Justice Roberts and the liberal wing, but filed a “Concurring Opinion” acknowledging that Justice Alito’s concern over some State and federal Court mishandling of Heller and McDonald warrants high Court review but that the Court can do so in other cases pending before the Court.

The high Court remanded the case to the New York Court of Appeals but only to discuss Petitioner’s argument for damages. But the issue of damages is of no consequence. It is injunctive relief the NYSRPA wanted. Anti-Constitutional forces in government consistently, unconscionably, and contemptuously enact laws designed to infringe the core of the Second Amendment without regard to the Heller and McDonald rulings. The NYSRPA wanted and expected the high Court to stop this. The gun transport case would have operated as a good test case. But the Court’s majority folded. What will New York City do in the future to restrict the fundamental right of the people to keep and bear arms?

JUSTICE ALITO’S DISSENTING OPINION

The Majority decided the case in a two-page decision. Justice Alito, who penned the McDonald decision, wrote a thirty-one page Dissent joined by Justices Thomas and Gorsuch. In his opening remarks Justice Alito began his Dissent with a blanket rebuke of the Majority’s Decision. He says:

“By incorrectly dismissing this case as moot, the Court permits our docket to be manipulated in a way that should not be countenanced.  Twelve years ago in District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U. S. 570 (2008), we held that the Second Amendment protects the right of ordinary Americans to keep and bear arms. Two years later, our decision in McDonald v. Chicago, 561 U. S. 742 (2010), established that this right is fully applicable to the States. Since then, the lower courts have decided numerous cases involving Second Amendment challenges to a variety of federal, state, and local laws. Most have failed. We have been asked to review many of these decisions, but until this case, we denied all such requests. On January 22, 2019, we granted review to consider the constitutionality of a New York City ordinance that burdened the right recognized in Heller.

WHAT IS REALLY GOING ON HERE?

The Supreme Court Majority did not want to deal with the Second Amendment since that means having to accept Heller and McDonald precedents. The liberal wing of the Court, especially, never wants to do this, and won’t.

Of course, the liberal wing never agreed with or accepted the Heller and McDonald rulings, and has consistently gone along with government actions to infringe the Second Amendment as if Heller and McDonald rulings never existed.

But, Justices Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch have had enough.

Alito made clear New York City’s rescission of the transport gun case rule simply amounts to City’s acknowledging the unconstitutionality of the rule and that the high Court would overturn it.

Justice Alito said, in closing:

“In sum, the City’s travel restriction burdened the very right recognized in Heller. History provides no support for a restriction of this type.  The City’s public safety arguments were weak on their face, were not substantiated in any way, and were accepted below with no serious probing. And once we granted review in this case, the City’s public safety concerns evaporated. We are told that the mode of review in this case is representative of the way Heller has been treated in the lower courts. If that is true, there is cause for concern. This case is not moot. The City violated petitioners’ Second Amendment right, and we should so hold.  I would reverse the judgment of the Court of Appeals and remand the case to the District Court to provide appropriate relief.”

The liberal wing of the Court consistently legislates from the Bench. They abhor the Second Amendment and if they were confident that they could overturn Heller and McDonald, they would do so in a heartbeat. At the moment, they cannot.

Chief Justice Robert’s decision comes as no surprise. Justice Kavanaugh’s vote does, however. His concurring opinion reflects that his heart and mind are with Alito, Thomas, and Gorsuch, but he went along with Roberts and the liberal wing of the Court anyway. Why did he do this? To say that the Court will have other opportunities to deal with unlawful attacks on Heller and McDonald doesn’t explain why he would pass on dealing with an outright attack on those seminal cases with a clear opportunity to do so with the gun transport case before him.  That is a “cop-out” pure and simple and Kavanaugh, a careful, perspicacious legal thinker and writer must be called out for an obvious act of frailty, unbefitting him.

Is Kavanaugh so really afraid the Radical Left will impeach him, as they have threatened? Does he think they will make good their threat if Biden defeats Trump in the upcoming General Election and if the Democrats not only hold onto the House, but win a majority in the Senate, too? Is the New York City gun transport case just an anomaly or does it signal what we may expect from Kavanaugh in the future: currying favor with the Radical Left and betraying intellectual honesty to halt an impeachment proceeding and trial?

On January 24, 2019 AQ wrote an extensive article on the New York gun transport case that, at the time, the high Court agreed to take up. Mayor DeBlasio and The New York Times were fearful and furious. You may read our article, “U.S. Supreme Court To Hear New York Gun Case; Mainstream Media Visibly Worried.”

In a forthcoming article AQ will analyze Alito’s dissenting opinion, along with Kavanaugh’s odd, evasive concurring opinion. We will deal with the issue of mootness which deserves serious attention; and will examine how dangerous this decision is for the entire Nation.

By Tyler Olson | Fox News

The Supreme Court on Monday refused to decide on the constitutionality of a controversial New York City gun law that has since changed, ruling in an unsigned opinion that the case is now "moot" because of the changes in the law.

The court's move to even hear the gun rights case despite a perceived procedural issue previously drew veiled threats from Democratic senators who filed a brief in the case, saying "[t]he Supreme Court is not well. And the people know it. Perhaps the Court can heal itself before the public demands it be 'restructured in order to reduce the influence of politics.'"

The statute in question initially restricted the transportation of firearms outside city limits -- even when licensed, locked and unloaded. The city's statute was later amended after the Supreme Court agreed to review it and New York state passed a law overruling the original version of the city's law. The court heard arguments over the original measure anyway.

"After we granted certiorari, the State of New York amended its firearm licensing statute, and the City amended the rule so that petitioners may now transport firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city, which is the precise relief that petitioners requested in the prayer for relief in their complaint," the unsigned opinion read.

"Petitioners’ claim for declaratory and injunctive relief with respect to the City’s old rule is therefore moot," it continued.

The Supreme Court sent the case back down to lower courts for undefined further action.

But Justice Samuel Alito issued a lengthy dissent in which he not only disputed whether the case is moot, but tore into the original New York City law as clearly unconstitutional.

Alito argued that the New York gun owners who sued over the original law didn't get "all the prospective relief they seek" because there was still a lack of clarity in the new version of the law on what travel restrictions actually apply to gun owners. Gun owners under the new law are told they have to bring their guns directly between their homes and gun ranges they wish to practice at with only "reasonably necessary" stops.

"But the meaning of a 'reasonably necessary' stop is hardly clear," Alito wrote. "What about a stop to buy groceries just before coming home? Or a stop to pick up a friend who also wants to practice at a range outside the City? Or a quick visit to a sick relative or friend who lives near a range? The City does not know the answer to such questions."

Alito also noted that if the Supreme Court ruled the original law was unconstitutional, then the gun owners on the case could seek damages from the city for the violation of their rights.

On the actual merits of New York City's now-replaced law, Alito made clear he thinks it violates the Second Amendment.

"This is not a close question," he wrote.

"If history is not sufficient to show that the New York City ordinance is unconstitutional, any doubt is dispelled by the weakness of the City’s showing that its travel restriction significantly promoted public safety. Although the courts below claimed to apply heightened scrutiny, there was nothing heightened about what they did," Alito said.

Alito continued, scolding the city over its arguments.

"In sum, the City’s travel restriction burdened the very right recognized in Heller," Alito said, referring to the landmark gun rights case. "History provides no support for a restriction of this type. The City’s public safety arguments were weak on their face, were not substantiated in any way, and were accepted below with no serious probing. And once we granted review in this case, the City’s public safety concerns evaporated."

Alito's dissent was joined in its entirety by Justice Neil Gorsuch and in part by Justice Clarence Thomas.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh issued his own opinion, straddling the fence between the unsigned opinion that refused to rule on the merits of the New York City law while also agreeing with Alito that lower courts are not sufficiently protecting the Second Amendment.

"I agree with the per curiam opinion’s resolution of the procedural issues before us—namely, that petitioners’ claim for injunctive relief against New York City’s old rule is moot," Kavanaugh wrote. "And I share JUSTICE ALITO’s concern that some federal and state courts may not be properly applying Heller and McDonald. The Court should address that issue soon, perhaps in one of the several Second Amendment cases with petitions for certiorari now pending before the Court."

While the case is a defeat for gun rights advocates, there may be a silver lining for those who wish to see the Supreme Court reinforce Second Amendment rights in the near future. With Kavanaugh, Alito, Thomas and Gorsuch all putting their names on opinions raising concerns about infringement of gun rights, there appears to be a large enough contingent of justices with a desire to boost such rights to force the court to hear future cases on the issue -- likely without the messy procedural issues in the New York case.

The Supreme Court agrees to hear cases under the "rule of four," meaning that if just four justices want the court to accept a case, the court will hear it.

The dissenting and concurring opinions from conservative justices got the attention of at least one gun-control group.

"We remain concerned that a number of Justices appear to have an appetite to expand gun rights at the risk of Americans’ rights to enact the gun laws they want and need," Brady United President Kris Brown said in a statement. "Brady remains determined and vigilant in our fight for Americans’ right to live, and self-determination on public safety issues, a fight which is far from over."

But other gun-control advocates saw the case as a victory, pure and simple. "Today’s decision to dismiss the case as moot is a victory for the rule of law and common-sense, constitutional gun safety laws. It’s yet another loss for an NRA and gun lobby that are in disarray and at odds with the majority of Americans who want the government to keep them safe," Hannah Shearer, the litigation director at the Giffords Law Center, said in a statement.

"This case is not moot," Alito concluded. "The City violated petitioners’ Second Amendment right, and we should so hold."

By ZACHARY EVANS,  April 27, 2020 11:00 AM
The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed a case brought by three New York City handgun owners challenging a city regulation that prohibited gun owners from transporting their firearms outside the city.

The court agreed to hear the case in December, but the city then amended the regulation to allow gun owners to bring firearms to other locations. The Supreme Court ruled 5-3 in an unsigned opinion that the case was moot because the city had amended its original regulation.

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Conservative justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch wrote in their dissent that the case should not have been dismissed.

“By incorrectly dismissing this case as moot, the Court permits our docket to be manipulated in a way that should not be countenanced,” the justices wrote. Lawyers for the plaintiffs had argued that the case should not be dismissed because the city changed its regulation due to fears that the Supreme Court would use the case to restrict broader gun control measures.

28

Gun rights advocates had initially hoped the court’s conservative majority would tip the case in their favor.

“I believe it will change the way the Second Amendment is applied to everyone who owns a gun in the country,” Romolo Colantone, a resident of Staten Island and one of the plaintiffs in the case, said in December 2019.

BY ROSS BARKAN  MARCH 5, 2020 11:11 A.M.

Health Commissioner Howard Zucker and Governor Andrew Cuomo speak at a COVID-19 briefing in Albany on Wednesday. MIKE GROLL / GOVERNOR'S OFFICE

In the wee hours of Tuesday morning, the state legislature approved $40 million in emergency funding to help contain the COVID-19 outbreak in New York. Buried within the legislation is a provision that has alarmed progressive lawmakers and advocates: an extraordinary, broad, and little-understood expansion of Governor Andrew Cuomo’s emergency powers.

“I’m scared or concerned because I don’t know what the governor has in mind,” said Assemblymember Richard Gottfried, the longtime chair of his chamber’s health committee.

With the support of both legislative leaders, the emergency funding bill overwhelmingly passed the Democrat-controlled Assembly and State Senate. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate Majority Leader, and Carl Heastie, the Speaker of the State Assembly, pushed for its passage, overriding the concerns of the health committee chairs in both chambers.

Cuomo did not offer a detailed explanation of his push to expand his emergency powers, telling reporters that “these are uncharted territories” and that “government has to respond.”

The whole process was rushed, in typical Albany fashion. Word came Monday afternoon that legislation would be coming to the floor from the governor’s office, Gottfried said. The state’s health commissioner, Howard Zucker, had met with Assembly Democrats for a briefing, making no mention of the need of additional emergency powers.

The Assembly and Senate hardly debated the bill. It passed both houses after midnight, with little time to read it or seek outside counsel. The Senate approved the measure 53-4, while the Assembly voted 120 to 12 in favor.

Though New York law already allows Cuomo to suspend provisions of any state or local statute that would delay in coping with a declared disaster, the new measure goes further, broadening the definition of disaster from a “past occurrence” to something that is “impending.”

The new law specifically added “disease outbreak” to a list of triggering events alongside “epidemic,” and gives Cuomo new power to issue directives “necessary to cope with” a broad list of potential disasters, from tornados to cyberattacks to volcanic eruptions.

The definition of disasters is general enough that critics fear Cuomo, a governor who already enjoys aggressively wielding executive power, can abuse the new law in a wide array of circumstances to override existing law.

“It’s a reckless expansion of executive power,” said State Senator Julia Salazar, a Brooklyn Democrat who voted against the bill.

In a statement, the New York Civil Liberties Union compared the new law to anti-terrorism provisions passed after 9/11 that were never used to prosecute terrorism. “We should not repeat the mistakes of 20 years ago. While the legislature should move expeditiously to fund and support the necessary public health response, nothing requires them to expand executive power without adequate consideration for the need or the potential consequences,” the NYCLU said.

Part of the challenge of understanding the expansion is the lack of specificity in the bill language. Since the governor already has expansive emergency powers, adding more could theoretically justify all kinds of maneuvers, like the declaration of martial law, unilateral travel restrictions, and mass quarantines.

The limits are largely unknown.

Assemblymember Yuh-Line Niou, a Manhattan Democrat, said Cuomo’s expansion of emergency powers deeply concerned her as an Asian-American legislator.

“One of my mentors was born inside an internment camp,” Niou said in an emotional Instagram video, referring to the unlawful detention of Japanese-American citizens during World War II. “I have an innate fear of what would happen if we allow our government to be able to weaponize fear and to be able to make a directive and have the power to order private citizens to do something without any checks and balances.”

As far as Gottfried understands, Cuomo’s new emergency powers would allow the governor to override the due process the people who are quarantined are entitled to under existing law, like a person being required to see a judge after being arrested for violating an order.

“Those are valuable safeguards,” Gottfried said. “As best as I can tell, the new law does away with them if the governor chooses to.”

The law has a sunset provision and the legislature will have to renew it in a year. It’s unclear if Cuomo would push for a renewal. The governor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We don’t fully understand the implications of the new powers versus the old ones,” said John Kaehny, the executive director of the good government group Reinvent Albany. “We have not had time to analyze its full scope.”

Kaehny compared the new expansion of emergency powers to another that is quietly up for renewal Thursday: Cuomo’s declaration of emergency over the subway system. The 2017 declaration, made when the subway system was breaking down at an alarming rate, allowed the MTA to bypass environmental and anti-corruption safeguards when seeking new contracts to do work. Under the emergency declaration, the MTA is currently allowed to bypass the competitive bidding process entirely and oversight from the state comptroller’s office.

The improving subway service hasn’t led to the removal of the emergency declaration.

Gottfried, who has served in the legislature since the 1970s, said he was perplexed because no governor had ever asked him to expand emergency powers during previous crises, whether it was the AIDS epidemic of the 1980’s, the response to Hurricane Sandy, or the 2014 Ebola outbreak.

“The governor and health commissioner never asked for anything like that, never said their hands were tied.”

Posted at 5:00 pm on April 16, 2020 by Cam Edwards

The Second Amendment Foundation and Firearms Policy Coalition have filed a federal lawsuit against Cherokee County, Georgia and Probate Court Judge Keith Wood over the decision to not accept concealed carry applications while the coronavirus pandemic is taking place. The suit was filed on behalf of Lisa Walters, whose husband Mark Walters might be familiar to readers as the host of Armed American Radio.

Unlike many states, even open carry in Georgia requires a “weapons license,” which means that if license applications aren’t being processed or even accepted, there’s no way for individuals like Walters to be able to legally bear arms for self-defense during the pandemic. If someone is found to be carrying a firearm without a license, they’ll not only likely face charges, but if convicted they’re ineligible to receive a license for at least five years.

According to the lawsuit, Judge Wood announced back on March 14th that his office would not accept any new carry license applications until May 13th, allegedly based on comments by the Chief Justice of the Georgia Supreme Court declaring a statewide judicial emergency. That declaration, however, is only advisory in nature, and doesn’t mention anything about suspending applications for a Georgia Weapons license.

Nevertheless, Defendant Judge Wood’s CPO claims the processing of carry licenses is a “NON-ESSENTIAL” matter, and declares that such applications “WILL NOT be accepted during the period covered by the judicial emergency.

Because of the State of Georgia’s general ban against the carrying of loaded, operable handguns outside the home or vehicles… from the moment the Cherokee County Defendants’ CPO order issued, law-abiding citizens not prohibited from possessing firearms and, but for the Cherokee County Defendants’ GWL program closure, otherwise entirely eligible to obtain a GWL—like and including Plaintiff Walters and all similarly situated individuals—have been and continue to be denied any chance to lawfully carry such a weapon in public, anywhere outside the limited confines of their homes, cars, and workplaces, for self defense or for any other lawful purposes.

This attorneys for SAF and FPC argue that this prohibition, temporary though it might be, nevertheless is an infringement on Lisa Walters’ right to bear arms in self-defense, as well as a violation of her 14th Amendment right to due process under the law.

Interestingly, the lawsuit doesn’t just challenge Judge Wood’s decision not to accept carry applications, but it also challenges the notion that Georgia residents need to possess a weapons license in order to bear arms in the first place. Even if the judge in this case doesn’t want to address the larger issue of Georgia’s carry laws, they could still rule specifically on the issue of the suspension of license applications. I suspect the judge will err on the side of a narrow ruling, but we’ll see what happens when the judge issues their opinion on the request for a preliminary injunction that would allow for the resumption of GWL applications.

BY DAN ZIMMERMAN |APR 13, 2020

We’ve extensively covered the pending New York State Rifle & Pistol Association case (see here). There’s no way of knowing how the court will rule, of course, but the gun control advocates at Salon and other media outlets seem to be girding for a decision that slaps down the city of New York and furthers gun rights for all Americans.

We certainly hope they’re right.

Realizing it would likely lose the case, New York City amended its transportation rule in June to permit residents to take their handguns to second homes, businesses or shooting ranges outside city limits. And in July, the city filed a formal motion with the Supreme Court, requesting that the case be dismissed as moot. The court denied the motion in October, setting the stage for another Second Amendment showdown.

In December’s oral arguments, the city again asked the court to moot the case. The city made no attempt to defend the transportation ban.

Unfortunately, given the city’s capitulation and the Supreme Court’s right-wing orientation, the only real remaining question is the scope of the NRA’s inevitable victory. Even if the court reconsiders the city’s request and enters a dismissal order, the NRA will walk away with a significant win, having forced the city to rescind one of the most stringent gun-control laws in the country. On the other hand, a decision on the merits on constitutional grounds in the NRA’s favor would reward the organization with an even bigger triumph, endangering gun-control laws everywhere.

A nation awash in firearms in the grip of the COVID-19 pandemic awaits the court’s decision, which is expected by the end of June.

– Bill Blum in The Supreme Court is poised to extend gun rights at the worst possible time.

Link to the Article

4/16/2020 9:44 PM, Anonymous

Health Commissioner Howard Zucker and Governor Andrew Cuomo speak at a COVID-19 briefing in Albany on Wednesday. Mike Groll / Governor's Office

In the wee hours of Tuesday morning, the state legislature approved $40 million in emergency funding to help contain the COVID-19 outbreak in New York. Buried within the legislation is a provision that has alarmed progressive lawmakers and advocates: an extraordinary, broad, and little-understood expansion of Governor Andrew Cuomo’s emergency powers.

“I’m scared or concerned because I don’t know what the governor has in mind,” said Assemblymember Richard Gottfried, the longtime chair of his chamber’s health committee.

With the support of both legislative leaders, the emergency funding bill overwhelmingly passed the Democrat-controlled Assembly and State Senate. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, the Senate Majority Leader, and Carl Heastie, the Speaker of the State Assembly, pushed for its passage, overriding the concerns of the health committee chairs in both chambers.

Cuomo did not offer a detailed explanation of his push to expand his emergency powers, telling reporters that “these are uncharted territories” and that “government has to respond.”

The whole process was rushed, in typical Albany fashion. Word came Monday afternoon that legislation would be coming to the floor from the governor’s office, Gottfried said. The state’s health commissioner, Howard Zucker, had met with Assembly Democrats for a briefing, making no mention of the need of additional emergency powers.

The Assembly and Senate hardly debated the bill. It passed both houses after midnight, with little time to read it or seek outside counsel. The Senate approved the measure 53-4, while the Assembly voted 120 to 12 in favor.

Though New York law already allows Cuomo to suspend provisions of any state or local statute that would delay in coping with a declared disaster, the new measure goes further, broadening the definition of disaster from a “past occurrence” to something that is “impending.”

The new law specifically added “disease outbreak” to a list of triggering events alongside “epidemic,” and gives Cuomo new power to issue directives “necessary to cope with” a broad list of potential disasters, from tornados to cyberattacks to volcanic eruptions.

The definition of disasters is general enough that critics fear Cuomo, a governor who already enjoys aggressively wielding executive power, can abuse the new law in a wide array of circumstances to override existing law.

“It’s a reckless expansion of executive power,” said State Senator Julia Salazar, a Brooklyn Democrat who voted against the bill.

In a statement, the New York Civil Liberties Union compared the new law to anti-terrorism provisions passed after 9/11 that were never used to prosecute terrorism. “We should not repeat the mistakes of 20 years ago. While the legislature should move expeditiously to fund and support the necessary public health response, nothing requires them to expand executive power without adequate consideration for the need or the potential consequences,” the NYCLU said.

Part of the challenge of understanding the expansion is the lack of specificity in the bill language. Since the governor already has expansive emergency powers, adding more could theoretically justify all kinds of maneuvers, like the declaration of martial law, unilateral travel restrictions, and mass quarantines.

The limits are largely unknown.

Assemblymember Yuh-Line Niou, a Manhattan Democrat, said Cuomo’s expansion of emergency powers deeply concerned her as an Asian-American legislator.

“One of my mentors was born inside an internment camp,” Niou said in an emotional Instagram video, referring to the unlawful detention of Japanese-American citizens during World War II. “I have an innate fear of what would happen if we allow our government to be able to weaponize fear and to be able to make a directive and have the power to order private citizens to do something without any checks and balances.”

As far as Gottfried understands, Cuomo’s new emergency powers would allow the governor to override the due process the people who are quarantined are entitled to under existing law, like a person being required to see a judge after being arrested for violating an order.

“Those are valuable safeguards,” Gottfried said. “As best as I can tell, the new law does away with them if the governor chooses to.”

The law has a sunset provision and the legislature will have to renew it in a year. It’s unclear if Cuomo would push for a renewal. The governor’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

“We don’t fully understand the implications of the new powers versus the old ones,” said John Kaehny, the executive director of the good government group Reinvent Albany. “We have not had time to analyze its full scope.”

Kaehny compared the new expansion of emergency powers to another that is quietly up for renewal Thursday: Cuomo’s declaration of emergency over the subway system. The 2017 declaration, made when the subway system was breaking down at an alarming rate, allowed the MTA to bypass environmental and anti-corruption safeguards when seeking new contracts to do work. Under the emergency declaration, the MTA is currently allowed to bypass the competitive bidding process entirely and oversight from the state comptroller’s office.

The improving subway service hasn’t led to the removal of the emergency declaration.

Gottfried, who has served in the legislature since the 1970s, said he was perplexed because no governor had ever asked him to expand emergency powers during previous crises, whether it was the AIDS epidemic of the 1980’s, the response to Hurricane Sandy, or the 2014 Ebola outbreak.

“The governor and health commissioner never asked for anything like that, never said their hands were tied.”

By Matt Mulcahy         Wednesday, April 1st 2020

OAKDALE, N.Y. — Two men looking to purchase guns to defend their homes are suing New York Governor Andrew Cuomo over his executive order that declares which businesses are essential during the COVID-19 pandemic. Firearms company Dark Storm Industries is also a party in the lawsuit making the complaint to Federal Court stating they can no longer sell weapons or ammunition to ordinary citizens in New York.

Both Brian Doherty and Kevin Schmucker reside in Suffolk County. They each began transactions to purchase long guns before the Governor issued an Executive Order mandating which businesses would be declared essential services during the pandemic. Gun retailers were excluded from being declared essential. Dark Storm Industries applied for an exception.

They received a response from New York State’s Empire State Development Corporation that said: “your business has been designated as essential solely with respect to work directly related to police and/or national defense matters are exempt from the current restriction.” Dark Storm sought further clarification. According to its legal claim, they replied to the ESD in an email asking, “So to be clear we may continue to conduct business with law enforcement and military but not civilians?” ESD responded, “Yes that is correct as advised by counsel.”

On its website, Dark Storm cites unprecedented demand during this time. They say they are sold out of rifles, shotguns, and ammunition. They also state they are closed to the public but are able to service police, military, and security.

The plaintiffs are asking the court to declare this Executive Order as unconstitutional. They are asking for an injunction to allow them to remain in business.

New York State has not yet responded to the suit filed in the United States District Court in the Northern District of New York. A court date has been set for June.