National Assn. For Gun Rights Files First Suit Challenging NM Gov. Grisham’s Unconstitutional Carry Ban

By
Dan Zimmerman
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75


You know your unconstitutional power-grab and civil rights suspension isn’t going well when such pro-gun eminences as Ryan Busse, Ted Lieu, and…wait for it…David Hogg are forced to issue public denunciations of your actions. Now, the first gun rights organization out of the blocks with a lawsuit and motion for a temporary restraining order is the National Association for Gun Rights.

Their motion for TRO is here and the complaint is here.

NAGR President Dudley Brown told TTAG . . .

Governor Grisham needs a copy of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights rushed to her office. Apparently she didn’t read them when she swore an oath to protect them.

Our emergency lawsuit will overturn Gov. Grisham’s dangerous citizen disarmament power grab, and hopefully, teach her and other tyrants that it won’t be tolerated.

TTAG’s favorite barrister LKB is reading them over and will have a quick assessment for us shortly. In the mean time, you can bathe in the knee-deep tide of schadenfreude that is the self-made legal and political disaster New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham has created for herself. Stay tuned.

UPDATE: Here comes Gun Owners of America with another lawsuit challenging the Governor’s carry ban. The motion for a TRO is here and the complaint is here.

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

75 COMMENTS

  1. Rights delayed by a court case are still Rights denied. You deserve the Tyrants and Tyranny…You Allow. nuff said.

  2. I’m sure a Hawaiian judge will be the first to pipe up and rule that the governor is 100% compliant with the constitution.

    • RE: “Governor Grisham needs a copy of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights rushed to her office. Apparently she didn’t read them when she swore an oath to protect them.”

      The US Constitution to people fixated on Gun Control is just another word for Doormat. NM Governor Michelle Grisham needs to see and smell where History Confirms her racist and nazi based Gun Control has been and leads to…
      https://youtube.com/watch?v=RTCs1-hOK_U&feature=shared

  3. “In the mean time, you can bathe in the knee-deep tide of schadenfreude that is the self-made legal and political disaster New Mexico Governor Michelle Lujan Grisham has created for herself.”

    Uhm, exactly how is it a “political disaster” if Leftist Scum ™ like her have the majority of the vote out there? 🙁

    • It’s not.

      Remember the day after the Rust shooting when I said Baldwin would walk scot-free while everyone else here was frothing at the mouth that he was going to prison?

      What did I say then? NM’s corrupt and tribal. He’s part of the tribe. A “good person”. He’ll face zero actual repercussions. That was the day after the shooting.

      And in April this year, what happened? Oh, all the charges were dropped. Shocker. I wonder how the fuck I knew that a year and a half in advance?

      What penalty did Baldwin pay? A 20 minute Zoom appearance in court and his lawyer’s fees. That’s it. As I said it would be.

      People don’t seem to understand that basically the only differences between New Mexico and the original Mexico are that NM is cleaner and, officially, English is the language for NM.

      • The United States, and thereby any state has no official language; most signage, documents, general usage, however, does favor standard American English.

  4. I have no doubt NM coordinated this action with the Biden Whitehouse and DOJ!!! This is intended to reach the Supreme Court.

    • Absolutely. This a test case. Soon other blue state governors will be abusing their emergency powers to do the same thing. She can’t be allowed to get away with this.

      • The state of Louisiana did a pretty good job of nullifying the second amendment after Katrina the hurricane.

  5. Until she’s frog marched out of the Governors’ mansion by Federal Marshalls, charged with treason and interred in Gitmo, ain’t nuttin’ gonna change.

  6. I have to agree with KRP — there’s something behind all of this that hasn’t yet been revealed.

    The Governor of NM wouldn’t have gone out so far on such a seemingly thin limb if she didn’t think that she had a safety net in place.

    Is there another shoe about to drop? What could it be?

    The ancient Chinese curse “May you live in interesting times” comes to mind.

    • Liberals like her drink so much of their own koolade, they believe they can do anything they please and she can unless the citizenry stop her.

    • Within NM it’s a smart game. I don’t know if her people consider national consequences, but considering her background they might.

      If a filing is presented in state court it’s very likely going to get messy.

      1. CCW and OC are not the same thing in NM. OC is protected by the NM Constitution while CCW is a creature of statute. She may have the authority to do this vis a vis CCW only. MAY.

      Now, the rural areas around ABQ will present an interesting question of enforcement. There are areas that simply won’t enforce this. Others might. This is also where you’re most likely to see OC. It’s not uncommon in NM to see people OCing while riding a horse. Ditto motorcycles. Screwing with ranchers over this probably won’t happen but it might along the edge of a city like Tijeras, which is in the affected area.

      So when you really think about this, CCW is pretty much unaffected because it will mostly go unnoticed. The chances that the stars align in this area for someone getting caught CCWing, being reported and then actually facing the cops is slim. So, it’s *illegal* but, IRL, who GAFs unless you have to shoot someone?

      That leaves OC which might face spotty enforcement but almost certainly WILL face enforcement from APD. Also, APD is kinda known for a “shoot first, question later” attitude. This makes it less likely someone would OC as a form of protest because they know there’s an above average chance that they’ll die in a hail of bullets from APD.

      And while it’s true that NM pulled immunity from the cops there’s a big question of if that applies here and if you’re dead how do the cops getting personally sued help you?

      Quite obviously this has a chilling effect in the area most likely to produce people who would violate the order just to get standing to go to court because while they might not like the rule they probably would like to live to see it struck down rather than have their estate prevail in court.

      Further, this is a statewide order but only applies to Bernalillo County and the city of Albuquerque, which is interesting for several reasons.

      First, the major population center for ‘Burque is actually the northern ‘burbs. They’re not affected by this. Rio Rancho and Bernalillo (the city) are both in Sandoval County. They’re unaffected. This is also where you’d expect THE MOST pushback against this.

      Since it’s a statewide order but only enforced in one area, can people from other parts of the state sue? Sure, but will they have standing? Maybe not.

      Further still, Bernalillo County is fairly large and much of it is sparely populated and parts of if are federal land. That brings up jurisdictional questions. She IS part of the party that runs those lands right now and there are some, shall we say “odd”, relationships between Tribal Police and other LE depending on which rez you’re talking about. I’m not intimately familiar with the Canoncito Rez, but it wouldn’t shock me if they’re pretty much in bed with the State or County in multiple ways. To be frank, NM’s corrupt in favor of TPTB within the state and the Democratic Party.

      Yet further, the time on this is obviously a nod to NM’s notoriously slow court system. Outside Federal Court I wouldn’t be surprised if you couldn’t get this in front of a judge before it expires. That would bring up a claim of mootness that a court might accept. In northern NM, that claim would likely prevail. In the South, probably not. In the affected areas, 50/50. But, again, in the areas where she’d be guaranteed to lose can you present an argument for standing that a court will accept? Maybe not.

      There are no other ways to look at this: Within the confines of NM, legally and politically, this is actually a shockingly shrewd move to grab power. It’s Ben Ray style NM politics which, generally, they’ve gotten away with for many decades.

      Purely politically, the idea that she’ll face consequences over this are close to zero. This woman put in rules that caused elderly people to have to stand in line for 10 hours in freezing temperatures to get groceries from Wal-Mart in Santa Fe (and other places) because Covid. These rules lasted for months and months. It didn’t really harm her politically to do that. Her use of the NMSP to enforce “border restrictions” because Covid also didn’t really hurt her.

      NM’s an odd place and she has a magic name (Lujan). She’s as close to untouchable in NM politics as you can get without being Ben Ray himfuckingself.

  7. Suing these tyrants would be more satisfying if they had to pay for their own defense attorneys, and pay the fine/settlements out of their own pocket. The tax payers are the ones paying for their defense in court. The way it is, there are no repercussions for the politicians violating constitutional amendments. That’s why they keep doing it.

  8. Its high time communities create their own home guard organiztions to push back on these unconstitutional laws and protect themselves and their fellow citizens before we become a police state. These are primarily Democrat politicians who pull these kinds of stunts and they are most likely being paid off to do so by the anti-gun and/or socialist leaning organizations. Its time to organize for self protection and defend your constitutional rights. Most important don’t reelect these people and demand voter id and transparency in all voter elections. They cheat and we all know it.

  9. Where are they filing? It matters.

    I’d go for the Federal Court, D.N.M., part of the 10th. There are just too many other questions if you to state court in NM.

    The more I consider exactly what this does, I’m actually kinda impressed with the level of chess the governor’s people are playing. Within the confines of New Mexico it’s a surprisingly smart game.

    • All three suits were filed in DNM, and my understanding is that’s where the other major suits that are in process will be. (There may be other suits that have been filed in state court, but I haven’t heard of them. From the little I know of NM state practice, I agree that a state case is unlikely to move anything like one will in federal court.)

      Tomorrow morning we should see who’s been assigned the filed cases, and whether they move quickly on the TRO.

  10. The Governor’s ban is just the latest expression of the Racist and Discriminatory practiced by DemonCrats since the Civil War! This action would ban black people from carrying black guns, white people from blue guns and brown people from silver guns. All colorswillhavetheir Rights deprived under Color of Law! It’s a Federal Civil Rights crime, punishable by jail Time!

    • There are basically no black people in New Mexico. The non-whites are nearly all Hispanic.

      They also generally like the governor because she married into the Lujan family which is the center of political power in the state since before Moses descended the mount with tablets of law.

      She’s got the name, she’s got the power base, she’s got the national party and, quite frankly at the power politics level, no one gives a fuck about blacks in NM because there might be a dozen in the entire state.

      The big families in NM politics tell the tale. There’s Lujan, Ortiz, Pino and Ortiz y Pino.

      You wanna play the race card in NM, you use Hispanics or you’re just wasting your breath.

      • “There are basically no black people in New Mexico. The non-whites are nearly all Hispanic. ”

        That pretty well sums up my personal experience in NM. I think there are more than merely dozens of black people, but they are a very minor minority. Note that I have never lived there, I just go there, take care of business, and GTFO.

        • In all the time I lived in, worked and attended school in Santa Fe along with all the times I’ve been back, totaling to many more months, I’ve seen exactly two black people. Both, quite obviously, tourists. They, uh, kinda stand out.

          In ABQ, I’ve seen five that I remember and I’ve spent decent time there.

          12 might be an undercount and slightly hyperbolic but it’s not a very big undercount. I’d be pretty surprised if you could find 120 no-shit black people living in the state. Hispanic-black mixes might get you 1000.

      • “They also generally like the governor because she married into the Lujan family which is the center of political power in the state since before Moses”

        Incorrect, she was born a Lujan and her father was not in politics, he was a dentist:

        “Michelle Lujan was born in Los Alamos, New Mexico, and grew up in Santa Fe. Her father, Llewellyn Eugene “Buddy” Lujan,[1] practiced dentistry into his eighties until he died in March 2011. Her mother, Sonja Lee (née Jackson),[2] was a homemaker originally from Indiana who died in 2022“

        She is distantly related to Ben Lujan, she is the Granddaughter of Eugene Lujan, fourth cousin of Ben Ray Lujan.

        • Correction accepted. Congrats Miner, you found an error in something I said. It only took you a decade.

          Doesn’t change the point I was making at all though. The state’s still an old boy’s club and the Lujans are one of the powerful and corrupt families in the state.

        • Lame. Having nothing useful to add, you feverishly scour wikipedia so you can heroically offer your “but actually”…

        • “Having nothing useful to add, you feverishly scour wikipedia so you can heroically offer your “but actually”… “

          How unsurprising that conservatives would find facts offensive.

  11. Both the sheriff and the Albuquerque police chief have denounced the executive order and are reluctant to enforce it. She can’t fire either one – the sheriff is an elected official and the chief is an employee of the city. The order is basically moot without enforcement. Another example of “we have to do something,” even if it doesn’t solve the problem.

    • I suspect the game is bigger than that.

      The two things that jump out to me are as follows, in order of the probability I assign to them:

      1. She’s testing to see what she can do with rolling emergency authority and believes she can do this because rolling authority got her everything she wanted with “covid” as a “public health emergency”. Why not this too?

      2. Less likely, but possible: A longer game might be afoot here. The “paper of record” for professional pols like her is the Santa Fe New Mexican. Always has been.

      When Ms. Grisham was first elected the paper produced a series of op-eds from “experts” suggesting that the governor should regulate OC out of existence and move NM to “CCW only” while making it much, much hard to get a CCW permit. This was openly stated to have the goal of limiting the number of people who can legally carry a gun significantly. Essentially, they wanted a NJ type model (which you will note, pretty much still stands).

      TTAG covered the introduction of a bill that was meant to do this. The bill failed. However, the idea hasn’t died but the problems with it remain. OC is covered by Art. II, Sec. 6 of the NM Constitution. CCW OTOH, is created by statute.

      What was being pushed, hard, by NM Lefties was the most difficult thing to do. Mostly, I think, at first this was due to ignorance of the structure of gun laws in NM. However, I know that this has changed because I personally informed them of the structure and how what they wanted to do required a Constitutional Amendment following the process laid out in the NM Constitution, which requires an Amendment to pass and then a year later a plebiscite to pass. This, as I pointed out, was a fool’s errand to even attempt because while popular in Santa Fe itself it wouldn’t be popular 10 feet outside the city.

      And so, it wouldn’t shock me if what’s going on here is part of a longer game to try to create a situation where Art II, Sec 6 can be legally rewritten to allow for the legislature and governor to have more intrastate power over the carrying of firearms.

      Since she got away with the same basic structure of regulation via “public health emergency” vis a vis the 1A and has paid no penalty for it at all, why not try it on the 2A?

      ===

      In either case, she doesn’t really care about the immediate enforcement. This is about centralizing power in the governorship since the NM legislature isn’t professionalized.

  13. I wonder what numb-nut told her to do this? Sorry you ignorant twat, you CAN’T suspend constitutional rights, EVEN IN AN EMERGENCY. Does she think she can suspend any of the other rights?

    • She suspended the 1A and the Privileges and Immunities Clause for over a year with zero consequences. No one on TTAG complained about those civil rights. More generally, no one seemed to really care. At all.

      Why would she think she can’t do that again? What incentive system have we, as a people, provided her that would discourage this behavior?

      None. We have provided none. Yet people wonder why the behavior continues. Odd, that. No one treats their kids this way.

      • While I have complained about various civil rights infringement over the last 3 years including 1st issues and may have been involved in a few class action suits……yeah your assessment isn’t that far off on how little attention that side of things gets especially when we win.

        • I’m personally of the opinion that “the Right” is no different than “the Left” except in preference.

          The Right loves to whine about things very selectively and then wonders how it is that they’re over a barrel with their pants down as .gov drops trou behind them and aims for lubeless penetration.

          A cynic might think that most Conservatives are neither Conservative nor remotely intelligent. They might further reason that most of them are lazy cowards. That cynic, basic on empirical data, might be right.

          Personally, I would argue for the “miseducated” hypothesis, and have done so publicly for about 15 years, but that’s getting harder and harder to defend as the years go by and the data piles up.

        • Bit hard to have a system of control if the relief valve actually reduces the control. Pain in the ass to figure the Rino’s from glowie plants but has gotten a bit easier with how both local and national media will bitch an uncontrolled fit when their boys and girls don’t get to play with our lives. I do expect that to change a bit when enough normal people pick up on that.

    • “you CAN’T suspend constitutional rights, EVEN IN AN EMERGENCY.”

      Actually, constitutional rights can actually be abridged, if martial law is declared. However, Lujan Stalin Grisham hasn’t even hinted at such a declaration, so, you’re mostly right.

      • There’s differing opinion on Martial Law, which is when law and punishment is taken over by the military. There are those that say that the federal government is bound at all times by the Constitution. Even under martial law, the government cannot suspend or violate constitutional rights.
        Then there are those that say it can. I tend to think that suspending the Constitution under Martial Law is pretty thin and the president has no legal authority to declare it. It’s almost exclusively done by Governors.
        Generally, the few times it’s been implemented, it is generally to restrict movement. If you recall after hurricane Katrina, New Orleans Chief of Police Eddie Compass ordered police and National Guard units to confiscate firearms from civilians who remained in the area. That didn’t go over too well and had repercussions.

      • Well if they suspend the Constitution they no longer have a Job, since they suspended the “DOCUMENT” they got their job under!!

        And they are no longer “PROTECTED”!!!!

      • “Actually, constitutional rights can actually be abridged, if martial law is declared”

        the constitution only provides that constitutional rights can be ‘suspended’ in case of ‘rebellion or invasion’ …not martial law being declared.

  14. Well, I will ask, because I don’t think anybody else will. Or perhaps people have forgotten. Or they don’t care. But the NRA has an enormous training facility in New Mexico.

    What do they have to say about this???

    And what has the Libertarian former NM governor Gary Johnson had to say???

    • The NRA’s influence in NM is about none. They’ve never had any.

      Gary Johnson hasn’t been even a bit player in NM politics since 2018.

      In either case, what they say matters somewhere between “very little” and “zero”.

      You guys really don’t understand that NM is “old school” in ways you can’t really comprehend if you haven’t lived there. In some regards it’s still the middle 1800’s out there. In some ways that’s really nice. In other ways it sucks big hairy donkey balls.

        • Roswell isn’t in Bernalillo County.

          And I suspect they outgun the NMSP, which is the agency tasked with enforcement. The New Mexican reports that they’re being ordered to flood ‘Burque for enforcement.

        • Which means exactly what?

          That they have some sort of say in the gun laws of the state? LOL, no. They don’t.

      • “Gary Johnson hasn’t been even a bit player in NM politics since 2018”

        Gary Johnson is an “authoritarian libertarian”. He’s comfortable. As long as he has his legal butt sex and drugs.

  15. In my state the governor championed legislation that made it a crime to use an emergency order to suspend Constitutional Rights. It was passed and signed in to law. Votes Matter.

    • Yes you live in a conservative majority state we got it but what relevance is that to states where that doesn’t apply.

        • I do not deny the severity of the situation merely your relevance to the solution. But do throw some more hollow catchphrases my way it totally proves me wrong.

  16. Those with a valid concealed carry permit should NOT abide by this unconstitutional dictate. Carry your firearm!

  17. You want to send a real message? Let them know that although the constitution has been tolerant to this point by using the courts to up hold it that this period of tolerance is coming to an end, and let them know that by deposing Grisham to start sending the message. Its what the colonists did to the British government in the colonies, deposed them and the British began to get the message that we will not stand for tyrants.

    Its what the founders expected the people to do to tyrants, depose them by law or by force as a last resort when the law failed and indeed the founders even included this as a Constitutional means through the Second Amendment. And it does not need to be ‘all the people’ either and there is no vote needed, so its doesn’t matter if the liberals or democrats or any politician or anti-gun people or pro-tyrant people don’t like it, anti-tyranny and pro-2A folks are the people too. Only about ~33% of the colonist fought to depose the British, there was no participating vote or permission or ‘majority decision’ of all the people needed.

    So yeah, sue Grisham to stop this order but Grisham herself needs to be stopped as well because tyrants can not be allowed to remain in power … so what really needs to be done is Grisham needs to be deposed to send the message that tyrants will not be tolerated. So is it about the 2A only? Well yes, but at the same time no. What its about is the Constitution … the mindset and/or action that an elected office position person can decide they have the power to decide if an inalienable right enumerated in the Constitutions Bill of Rights, no matter what that right is, can not be exercised is even by its self tyranny, for them to take a power never granted them and forbidden for them to have is tyranny, to enact that unconstitutional and illegal power they seized unto them selves is tyranny. To rid that office of tyranny Grisham needs to be deposed.

    At one time in the past some Democrats actually embraced the Constitution. For example; Liberal Democratic Vice President and Minnesota Sen. Hubert Humphrey, the congressional leader of the civil rights movement, expressed, on the subject of tyranny, “Certainly one of the chief guarantees of freedom under any government, no matter how popular and respected, is the right of citizens to keep and bear arms. … But the right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against a tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible.”

    And indeed, history has proven it is possible and its alive today with Biden and all these anti-gun governors, and these anti-gun groups and we see now a very public display example of history repeating its self with this Grisham tyrant.

    • Well said. These treasonous traitors are like bullies…. They will continue to do what they want until they are stopped.

      “ when the people fear the government, there is tyranny …..WHEN THE GOVERNMENT FEARS THE PEOPLE, THERE IS LIBERTY”

      maybe it’s time to cause these people to start losing sleep at night ……

    • Note: I am not proposing that a bunch of people run into the governors office and drag her out right now and I am not proposing the use of force to depose her right now and I’m not proposing a rebellion. The state legislature needs to attempt to remove her from office now, depose her. All means under law should be tried, and failing by using the law and being law abiding in following that law it comes down to the people if that be by ‘voting’ her out or as a last resort when all the other means have failed then being more forceful. Its the pattern and means set by the founders, and it is constitutional.

      Tyrants must not be permitted to remain in power. The right to fight and remove tyranny is universal. For example, as stated in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, adopted by the United Nations in 1948, “[I]t is essential, if man is not to be compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and oppression, that human rights should be protected by the rule of law.” The Universal Declaration was influenced by the Declaration of Independence, in part due to the US delegation led by Ambassador Eleanor Roosevelt (who carried her own handgun for protection).

      Inalienable rights are human rights, period. The Second Amendment is an inalienable right, no matter if one agrees that it is or not.

      The Second Amendment does, however, reinforce the rule of law and anti‐​tyranny structure of the US Constitution, by ensuring the government cannot disarm the people (for example like Grisham is trying to do here). It even has a specific order to government (which includes state governments as well) to not disarm the people and that order is ‘shall not be infringed’ – its says specifically ‘shall not be infringed’. Any ‘government’ entity be it state or federal that acts contrary to that order is an enemy of the constitution and the people and is a tyrant.

  18. theyre trying to get us to insurrect
    for real
    not fake insurrect
    like j6
    the want a reason
    they need a reason
    to invoke the insurrection act
    so they can run the table
    our job
    is to not take the bait
    not yet anyway
    when its time
    we will all know
    there will be no doubt

  19. I think she made a big mistake.
    She thought she would do something that was questionable in the first place but did it anyway to get points politically. It blew up in her face with the amount of attention it is getting not at the local level but the national level. I would not be surprised if she did a 180.
    Anyways it could be a good pro-2ndA strengthing if her emergency edict was declared un-Constitutional.

  20. Look over here, not over there; oldest trick in the politically sick’s book.

    Still, it works every time.

  21. Calling this governor a moron is an insult to morons……

    Remember she paid $150,000 to a former male staffer after pouring a bottle of water on his crotch then grabbed his his genitals through his clothes while she laughed in front of other staffers during a 2018 meeting.

    Not the sharpest knife in the drawer.

  22. Any law infringing upon a U.S. citizen’s right to bear arms is contrary to the 2nd Amendment to the United States Constitution, and is, therefore, invalid.

  23. Oh I see, the concealed carry holders are the ones committing all these crimes that forced her to do this.
    Now it makes sense. The hell with the 2A.

  24. “Governor Grisham needs a copy of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights rushed to her office.”

    And administered like an enema…

  25. Remember Katrina when then POTUS 43 along with the LA governor suspended the right of any arms (in your own home or otherwise). Those arms confiscated with their hobnail boots on the necks of American citizens just trying to survive. All the while there were roving gangs going through neighborhoods. Whoops did I conflate gangs with enforcers?

  26. Never mind the “file suit”. Anyone with law enforcement authority, sworn to support, and defend the Constitution, should arrest the governor for violating the Constitution.of course, getting a communist democrat judge to sign off on the arrest warrant, is something else!

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