The California State Assembly passed AB 1594, which allows survivors of gun violence in California to sue gun manufacturers and sellers for damages if the gun was sold in violation of a new firearm industry standard of conduct.
The bill was approved by a vote of 50-20 and now heads to the California State Senate for consideration.
If enacted, the bill will create an industry standard of conduct in California that will require manufacturers and sellers to establish reasonable controls on the sale and marketing of guns. In the language of the legislative comments that accompanied the bill, gun manufacturers and sellers may be sued if they are “irresponsible, reckless, and negligent in the sale or marketing of their products in California.”
Types of conduct that could fall into that category would be the sale of guns that are “most suitable for assaultive purposes” rather than for hunting or self-defense. Another category would be sales that target minors or other individuals legally prohibited from buying firearms.
The statute is designed to permit state law actions against gun manufacturers and sellers that might otherwise by precluded by the federal “Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act” signed into law on Oct. 26, 2005 by then President George W. Bush. The federal statute provides immunity to manufacturers and sellers if a gun they have sold is used illegally.
There are several exceptions to the federal immunity, one of them is applicable when the manufacturer or seller “knowingly violated a state… statute applicable to the sale or marketing of the product.”
The legislative comments to the bill note that courts have differed on interpreting the scope of the federal exception. Two courts–one of them the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit (the federal appellate court that covers California) — adopted narrow interpretations of the exception. Those courts said that the exemption does not apply to state laws that are generally applicable to the sale or manufacture of commercial products, but only to state laws that specifically apply to the firearms industry.
AB 1594 seeks to fall within that narrow interpretation by creating a law that is specifically applicable to the firearms industry.
The bill — co-authored by The Brady Campaign and California Attorney General Rob Bonta — was introduced by Assemblymembers Phil Ting, D-San Francisco; Mike Gipson, D-Compton; and Chris Ward, D-San Diego.
Ting said, “It’s not fair that almost every industry in the United States can be held liable for what their products do, yet the gun industry is exempt from that, providing no incentive to follow our laws.”
Ting added, “Hitting their bottom line may finally compel them to take every step possible to prevent illegal sales and theft of firearms to reduce gun violence.”
In addition to individuals who have been harmed by gun violence in California, the bill allows the attorney general, as well as city and county attorneys, to bring actions to enforce the provisions of the bill.
If enacted, the bill would take effect July 1, 2023.
Ting is an idiot. If you sell a defective firearm and it causes death or injury you can indeed sue the manufacturer.
If this passes, it will open the door to suing every manufacturer of anything.
Get killed with a baseball bat? Your family can sue Lousiville Slugger? Get killed by a drunk Pelosi in a Porsche? Your family can sue Porsche?
How would marketing guns irresponsibly look? When is the last time you saw an advertisement for a firearm in this state?
I was wondering the same thing. Can anyone name ANY current marketing for guns?
Advertising and Marketing are not one in the same…
That being said…. This Bill is a waste of time………………….
So who determines ‘assaultive in nature vs self defense’?
If I have multiple tangos in my house, an AR-15 becomes self defense as pumping rounds into the shotgun takes too much time. Or what about an auto shotgun? A shotgun is great home defense weapon, but does ‘auto’ in front of it change it from self defense to assaultive?
I am not a gun owner, but I support their rights. If we are going to hold gun manufacturers accountable, do we hold car manufacturers accountable when the drunk gets behind the wheel? Their car was driven by a drunk that killed the family. Do we hold McDonald’s accountable for obesity because they supplied the food to the obese individual who is has wheat attack and dies.
Drinks kill on average 11,000 people a year.
Gun violence is attributed to 44,000 a year but it should be noted that some of that is gang violence. But if a gang member shoots multiple people, is that now called a mass shooting? I am not up on my BLM terminology.
Obesity causes a 300,000 deaths a year.
About 2/3 of gun deaths per year are suicide.
Is it a coincidence that anti-gun legislation is always pushed after a mass shooting? ..in this case a mass shooting of very suspicious circumstances.
Canada has already taken it one step further with handgun sales being banned. So who benefits from these mass shootings?
Can you imagine this law in the hands of our DA? The courts will not have time for prosecuting criminals.
I read the headline.
Already know what the goal is.
It’s that simple.
They are attempting to discourage current legal gun dealers from
staying in business and prevent new legal gun dealers from entering the business by threatening both criminal and civil legal action if someone buys a firearm from them and commits another mass shooting even if they pass a background check.
And with this law, the politicians basically believe the background check is not enough and the threat of a mass shooting is now a potential goal to every person who wants to buy a gun, these gun dealers will need a crystal ball in their backroom they will have to go and rub which tells them to sell a firearm to the individual wishing to buy the firearm or not. Otherwise legal gun dealers will face the wrath of the legal system both criminally and on a civil level in the case they sell a firearm to another mass shooter. Crystals balls do not exist, so therefore legal gun dealers will eel like not taking the risk of selling firearms in general thanks to this law.
Another government plot to curb the flow of all legal firearms into it’s society.
My question is, when are liberals, democrats, and socialists finally going to admit they want to just simply ban all guns because none of the current laws are working to keep gun violence down and everything just keeps getting worse and worse anyways?
How many mass shooting incidents will it take for the Second Amendment to be repealed?
And how many people are going to care about the law anyways when all firearms are banned?
Fifty one people shot in Chicago this weekend and they continue to do nothing meaningful to stop it. Probably not one legally gun sold in the lot. What the hell country are we living in?
Yet another attempt by California to nullify Federal laws and the U.S. Constitution. This is just gun-grabbing by another name!
Lol, and is Alcohol marketed “responsibility”???
I guess anyone who was a victim of a drunk can now sue Anheuser Busch etc…..
Now do the same for wine. Especially wine produced in-state.
Fat chance!!!
AD
Newscum would never allow it.
Ahhh, the irony..
And the clown show continues.
“It’s not fair”.
Is it fair California Government is run like a private progressive tea party?
(No pun intended)
Vote Bonta out.
Another DEM-a-fornia law enforcing businesses shouldn’t locate in CA.
Call the bill what it is, a lawyer full employment act.
Latest fatality of CA’ anti business politicians and unaccountable bureaucrats,
Steel plant in Pittsburg will be closing. Has for over 110 years of providing mainly UNION living wage jobs.
SIX HUNDRED LIVING WAGE JOBS . . . . GONE FOREVER ! ! ! !
My grandfather was a steel mill worker in that plant. My grandfather fought for the unions. This is horrible. All the lost jobs. So wrong.
Can we sue the Assembly for treason?
This is just political theater. The democrats always use mass shootings and any horrific disaster to push their warped ideology. Like most of their oppressive laws they pass , it will be thrown out because it is unconstitutional. They know this but they also know the California voters are not very smart and will believe these corrupt lying politicians care about them.
There are hundreds of millions of guns in the hands of U S citizens. If it is the guns that are the reason we have murders and mass killings , we should be having thousands and thousands a week. I can see a revolution in the future and these do nothing evil politicians will be responsible.
The recent shooting proved that the police cannot be relied upon to protect you.
The supreme court has ruled that police have no obligation to protect you: https://prospect.org/justice/police-have-no-duty-to-protect-the-public/
“Based on these precedents, Lozito was told in the New York City case that “no direct promises of protection were made” to him, and therefore he could not sue the police for failing to come to his aid. In other words, the police do not have to act if someone is actively being harmed, they do not have to arrest someone who has violated orders, and they do not have any obligation to protect you from others.:
So the police won’t and aren’t required to risk their lives for you.
Eschewing any crumb of the second amendment would be unwise given the fact that the police will not and are under no obligation to protect you or your family.
Out here on the frontier, a call was made on 9-1-1 to report a criminal trespass. The 9-1-1 dispatcher said, “I’m so sorry, we have no one to send out at this moment.” I said, “So we’re on our own?” I sent an email to the County Sheriff to ask if this was true and he said “Yes.” If you don’t have protection in your home for what’s coming, you need it NOW.
1. Never outsource your own security/protection in the home. (And..to be clear…video camera systems are NOT “security” systems…they are suveillance systems. All they will do when you are being robbed/killed/whatever is take the perps picture.)
2. When seconds count, the police are just minutes away (if they can/will come at all). This is related to my first comment above.
3 Realize that you don’t have any right to police protection/services. It is at their discretion as to when/if/how they respond. Now in an emergency they will likely come as fast as they can (barring no conflict of resources at the moment), but you don’t have a RIGHT for them to come at all (see Supreme Court decisions on this matter).
The U.S. is third in murders throughout the world.
If you discount the following:
1. Chicago
2. Detroit
3. Washington DC
4. St Louis
5. New Orleans
Then the U.S. would be 189 out of 193 countries in the entire world.
All five cities have STRICT gun laws, and are run by democrats.
What does that tell you??
Stop and frisk and long jail terms would slow it way done but equity is holding them back. Common sense is not our strong suit any longer.
That’s the Dems for you, never address the real problem. Just punish legally owned and operated business’s and gun owners for the acts of one. None of this will ever make it any safer for anyone at all. The states DA Rob Bonta is a political fool and just watching his ad campaign on TV shows that. There end goal is to disarm the American public, and we all know how that ends up from examples in history from around the world.
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Firearms are inanimate objects and are not the “problem”. They do not feel pain, anger, or frustration.
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It’s the people… lawmakers should focus on criminals and violent individuals rather than the firearm manufacturers.
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This proposed legislation is HIGHLY misguided.
I
exactly. The problem, Exit 12A, is that you and I and not enough others in this state realize that basic simple fact.
Happy Pappy. and Texas is run by a Republican governor. Just sayin’
And Texas has a homicide rate of 6 for every 100,000 while Chicago is 18 per 100,000
Just saying.
Wake up the Democrats create problems with there policies
I’m pretty sure that deer and other game would consider firearms used for hunting as “assaultive in nature”. What does that even mean?
Also, what is a “seller”? Does that include people who sell their firearm to someone else through an FFL01 (i.e. federally licensed firearm dealer)? Who is on the hook? One? The other? Both?
Everyone should be able to have a shotgun or a revolver to defend their home. Folks who actually need to hunt for survival should be able to have a bolt-action rifle. But glocks and AR-15s? No way, those things should all be melted down. This is what will actually save a lot of lives. Might as well just ban the sale on all autoloaders, and repeal the 2nd amendment if that is what it takes to stop sales of AR-15s in the backwards, conservative states. In most sane places it can be stopped regardless…just ignore the Feds.
Well, the Constitution spells out exactly how to repeal it. Knock yourselves out…
brush up on history, Vandy, to understand why semiautos should be owned by the general population.
There is a burglar who is able to pick locks that looks for garbage cans not put away a couple of days after garbage pickup. If your neighbor leaves town and forgets or neglects to ask someone to put away their cans do it for them.
Taking firearms away from law-abiding citizens will not prevent crime or carnage.
Criminals of all kinds, including those with mental illnesses, will not observe any laws. It is these individuals who should be targeted, not law-abiding folks.
Alternatives to guns, such as bombs and poisons, will be used by someone intent on mass murder.
Instead of focusing on the innocent, the government should concentrate on the source of the problem.
Does this include guns traded for drugs that happens in living rooms? Because that’s where the “root cause” of the issue lies. If you’re focused on guns and school shootings, put your efforts into mental health, because that’s where the root cause is
They’re going after semi-auto rifles of every make. That is their end-goal.
We will be left with single-shot, pump-action and bolt-action rifles.
If you think M1As were safe, think again. The CMP will stop selling WWII-era M1 Garands in California as well.
Nobody wants to take your guns. Nobody is grooming your children. No such thing as election fraud. Stop being so paranoid…
.. so if somebody is DUI and hurts somebody – the victim can sue Ford? … oh yeah – for Newsom that makes sense
When will be able to sue the fast food chains for obesity, diabetes, high blood pressure and heart disease? Or how about the makers of sugar flavored drinks that cause hypertension, obesity, and diabetes? Lets go after the manufacturers of alcoholic beverages and distilled spirits for health problems like liver, stomach, and other forms of cancer caused by their products.
How about passing a law to regulate security for our schools.