New Jersey Attorney General Gurbir Grewal is a Tyrant

This past Tuesday, Firearms Policy Coalition, Firearms Policy Foundation, Second Amendment Foundation, Defense Distributed, The Calguns Foundation, California Association of Federal Firearms Licensees, and FPC's Founder Brandon Combs sued Gurbir Grewal, the Attorney General of New Jersey.

…on Saturday, February 3 the CodeIsFreeSpeech.com website’s act of republishing some of Defense Distributed’s digital firearms information “was met with yet another of Grewal’s Orwellian take-down orders,” demanding that Cloudflare “delete all files described within 24 hours or [Grewal’s Office] will be forced to press charges.”

As a result of Grewal's threat to press charges, the files that were hosted on codeisfreespeech.com have been removed. According to the Declaration of Brandon Combs, “But for the challenged statutes, the challenged policies, practices, laws, and customs of, and the threat of prosecution by the New Jersey Office of the Attorney General, CIFS [Code is Free Speech] and all of its contents and files would have remained publicly-accessible, including to persons in the State of New Jersey.”

The complaint alleges that Grewal violated the Plaintiffs' First and Second Amendment rights in addition to Equal Protection and Due Process violations. In relation to the First Amendment claim, the Plaintiffs contend that “Grewal’s conduct violates the First Amendment doctrine regarding content based speech restrictions,” and as such “the restrictions are an unconstitutional abridgement of First Amendment’s freedoms because they do not serve a compelling governmental interest and are not narrowly drawn to serve any such interest.”

The Plaintiffs also have claimed that “Grewal’s conduct infringes the individual right to make and acquire Arms, which is part and parcel of the right to keep and bear Arms; as such, it is an unconstitutional abridgement of Second Amendment rights.” The complaint seeks declaratory and injunctive relief, including “a declaration that Grewal unconstitutionally abridged the Plaintiffs’ First [and Second] Amendment freedoms and an injunction protecting the Plaintiffs from such abridgement in the future—both on a preliminary basis while this action is pending and permanently.”

In addition to a complaint, the Plaintiffs have filed a Motion for a Temporary Restraining Order and Preliminary Injunction. If granted, Grewal would be prevented from:

(1) enforcing New Jersey Statute § 2C:39-9(l)(2) (New Jersey Senate Bill 2465 § 3(l)(2)) against Plaintiffs,

(2) directing the Plaintiffs to cease and desist publishing computer files with digital firearms information, and

(3) directing the Plaintiffs’ communication service providers to cease and desist publishing Plaintiffs’ computer files with digital firearms information.

To learn more about the lawsuit visit GurbirGrewalisaTyrant.com

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Adam Kraut is a firearms law attorney practicing in southeastern PA and across the country federally. He hosts The Legal Brief, a show dedicated to crushing the various myths and misinformation around various areas of the gun world and The Gun Collective Podcast. He was also the general manager of a gun store in the suburbs of Philadelphia.