Newsom signs new gun control laws, including one requiring owners to take a 4-hour class

Have a gun? You're going to need to take another safety class after Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a package of bills Saturday that are a boon to gun control advocates and anathema to Second Amendment groups.

The law, Senate Bill 948, would apply to current residents with newly purchased guns starting in 2029. The class would need to be at least four hours long. Starting in 2028, people moving to California with guns would need to obtain a firearm safety certificate within 180 days of arrival. Berkeley Democratic Sen. Jesse Arreguín wrote the legislation.

It was one of 10 gun safety laws Newsom signed. They represent his last gun control efforts as governor, and his own record shows that some of the measures will likely face legal challenges from pro-firearm organizations. For instance, the 2016 ballot proposition Newsom carried that demanded background checks for ammunition purchases is awaiting a final determination from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

Rebecca Marcus, a lobbyist for the gun control organization the Brady Campaign, told lawmakers in March that more than 69,000 shootings resulted in death or required urgent medical care in California from 2016 to 2021. Roughly a third of those shootings were accidental, she said, and many involved children.

In a press release, Newsom described the cadre of signed pieces of legislation as efforts to “address multiple stages of firearm-violence prevention: identifying and understanding crime guns, preventing prohibited possession, intervening when someone poses a risk, safely storing firearms, improving training and accountability, supporting young survivors and responding to emerging technologies.”

Emma Brown, executive director of the gun safety advocacy group Giffords, commended Newsom for signing the laws. “California leads the nation in gun safety because its leaders work tirelessly to prevent violence and keep communities safe,” she said in a written statement. “The policies enacted today will save lives by closing loopholes and investing real resources in community violence intervention.”

But pro-gun group California Rifle and Pistol Association faults the four-hour exam law as a possible infringement on Second Amendment rights. Its members fear they’ll be on the hook for expensive safety classes, which they view as one more tax on gun ownership in California.

The group is fine with voluntary courses, but not a mandatory one as a prerequisite for acting on a constitutional right, it indicated in an opposition letter.

“Public safety is better served by enforcing existing laws against prohibited persons, prosecuting violent criminals, and supporting voluntary education programs,” the group wrote.

Another law Newsom signed would expand the list of persons barred from owning weapons. Senate Bill 1220 would bar a person from owning a gun for 10 years if they're convicted of stripping a gun of its serial number information that law enforcement officers use to track weapons.

“Imposing a 10-year blanket prohibition on Second Amendment rights for such misdemeanors goes beyond what is necessary for public safety,” the California Rifle and Pistol Association wrote in an opposition letter.

And with Newsom’s signing of Assembly Bill 1743, cities and universities in California can request data from the state Department of Justice on weapons recovered during criminal investigations. A supporter of the legislation, Brady United to End Gun Violence, argued that by allowing academics to look up the serial numbers of the guns, research can be strengthened on how weapons find their way from manufacturers to crime scenes. “Are the guns coming from in state? Are they coming from a specific county? Are they coming from nearby or far away? Are they coming from a specific dealer?” the Brady organization asked.

But this bill too was opposed by guns rights groups, including the rifle and pistol association. It wrote that the legislation “poses significant risks to the privacy and safety of California's law-abiding gun owners and could be weaponized to advance anti-gun agendas.”

That agenda seems to be well signalled by California’s political leaders. After signing the bills, Newsom said he “couldn't be more proud of California's continued bold leadership on gun violence prevention.”

This article was originally published on CalMatters and was republished under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives license.