By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
The past 12 months have witnessed a sea change for the Second Amendment, despite the fact that Blue State liberals are scrambling to destroy gun rights in their own states, and they are seething over how the second Trump administration has scrapped many of the policies of the Joe Biden administration.
While the West Coast states, plus New York, New Jersey, Maryland, Delaware, Rhode Island, Colorado, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Illinois, Minnesota and Michigan remain under anti-gun Democrat control, 2025 has given heartburn to the gun prohibition lobby.
Almost immediately after being sworn in, President Donald Trump abolished Biden’s White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention. Within weeks, he issued an executive order which resulted in the Justice Department’s launch of a Second Amendment Enforcement Task Force. Subsequently, DOJ’s Civil Rights Division opened a Second Amendment Section. The DOJ sued the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s office, followed by the Virgin Islands police and then the District of Columbia over gun permit issues. There is likely more to come.
Beginning in January, and continuing through the year, SAF Investigative Journalism editor Lee Williams did a series of reports about Patrick “Tate” Adamiak, a sailor targeted by the Biden-era ATF for alleged crimes involving gun law violations which Williams’ reporting maintains he never committed. The stories—30 in all, so far—amount to a deep dive into how an agency was weaponized during the Biden years.
Elsewhere, Williams offered a perspective on Biden’s gun control agenda that underscored widespread belief that the Delaware Democrat was the most anti-gun president in the nation’s history.
In April, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms called on Attorney General Pam Bondi to point her Second Amendment Task Force toward a dozen states where restrictive gun control measures have been passed.
The September assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk did not ignite a new wave of gun control proposals. Perhaps because the slaying was committed with a bolt-action hunting rifle, the gun prohibition lobby was surprisingly silent.
That was not the case following a mass shooting at a Manhattan office building in July by a killer who drove across country—violating various gun control laws in the process—to kill four people before taking his own life. Anti-gunners called for more “common sense” gun laws which, had they been in effect, still would not have prevented the attack.
Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, ending the year in the middle of a scandal in volving the alleged fraudulent use of billions of taxpayer dollars, was unable to bring the state legislature into session to consider gun control measures he wanted to push. Instead, he issued some executive orders including the formation of a “statewide safety council” which includes not a single member of a gun rights organization.
Following the slaying of Minnesota State Rep. Melissa Hortman and her husband, and the attempted murder of state Sen. John Hoffman and his wife at their residence, anti-gunners did call for more gun control.
In Oregon, the state Supreme Court heard oral arguments in the challenge of gun control Measure 114, without issuing a ruling. In the meantime, Democrats at the state capitol in Salem pushed through some bills to essentially get around the court challenge.
In neighboring Washington, anti-gun Democrats adopted legislation to require gun buyers to obtain a permit-to-purchase from the State Patrol, and take a gun safety course, prior to being able to buy a firearm. The law takes effect May 1, 2027, and will likely draw civil rights lawsuits at both the state and federal levels.
A similar requirement was adopted in Colorado, to become effective in August 2026.
Another Washington story revealed how the billionaire-backed gun prohibition lobby in Seattle had obtained more than $365,000 in funding from the state Department of Commerce for “grants, benefits & client services,” while the group’s Victory Fund was donating tens of thousands of dollars to anti-gun political candidates. While TGM reported this, along with Ammoland News, local media ignored the story.
Down in Alabama, State Rep. Barbara Drummond ran to become mayor of Mobile. She lost, possibly due in part to her pledge to use the Mayor’s office to push for additional gun controls. She lost to a Republican.
Early in the year, anti-gun activist David Hogg was booted as a vice chair of the Democratic National Committee.
In May, CCRKBA called on the administration to launch an IRS probe of a gun control organization which allegedly had offered former NRA President Marion Hammer millions of dollars to “retire and cease advancing the interests of the NRA and defending the Second Amendment.”
The following month, CCRKBA weighed in on the school shooting in Austria, noting that it happened in a nation where gun registration is required. The group said the shooting exploded several myths perpetuate by the gun control lobby.
Gun rights organizations, including the Second Amendment Foundation, National Rifle Association, Gun Owners of America, National Association for Gun Rights, Firearms Policy Coalition and California Rifle & Pistol Association, plus many smaller state-level groups, continued filing legal challenges to gun control laws around the country. Presently, there are dozens of lawsuits at various stages of progress, and 2026 will see more.
