For decades, the United States Post Office has been a ‘Gun Free Zone’ with signage promising major fines and jail time for any violation.

But that gun ban is starting to collapse.

Last year, a federal court ruled that the United States Postal Service’s sweeping ban on firearms violated the Second Amendment.

And now the Trump Administration has delivered another massive blow to the Post Office gun ban.

The Justice Department has formally concluded that federal law does NOT prohibit law-abiding Americans from carrying firearms for self-defense inside ordinary Post Offices that are open to the public!

This fight centers around 18 U.S.C. § 930, the federal law governing firearms inside federal facilities.

That law generally restricts firearms inside federal buildings. But Congress specifically included an exception for the lawful carrying of firearms “incident to hunting or other lawful purposes.”

For years, federal bureaucrats have interpreted that language as narrowly as possible.

But the Trump Justice Department just concluded that carrying a firearm for SELF-DEFENSE is exactly the kind of “lawful purpose” Congress protected in 18 U.S.C. § 930!

In a formal legal opinion issued by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel, DOJ made the point crystal clear:

Carrying a firearm for self-defense while entering a building that is open to the public is a lawful purpose protected by federal law.

That means federal prosecutors cannot simply treat an otherwise law-abiding gun owner like a criminal for carrying a constitutionally protected firearm for self-defense into an ordinary Post Office.

And this isn’t happening in isolation.

Last year, federal Judge Reed O’Connor ruled that the Postal Service’s sweeping gun ban violated the Second Amendment as applied to the gun owners who challenged it.

The federal government appealed that decision.

But last month, the Trump Administration DROPPED that appeal — leaving the gun owners’ victory intact.

Now DOJ has gone even further. They concluded that the Postal Service cannot use its own regulations to override what Congress authorized in federal law.

And DOJ warned that even if USPS had the statutory authority to impose its sweeping gun ban, there would be “grave doubts” about whether that prohibition could survive the Second Amendment.

There are still important details being worked out. And gun owners need to be very careful during this time.

— The old USPS regulation remains formally on the books.
— This is a Executive Branch interpretation; not a new law.
— A new administration could reverse this. 

But make no mistake: the legal foundation underneath the Post Office gun ban is crumbling and that’s a win that we wanted to make sure you heard about.

For New York State,

Aaron Dorr
Executive Director
NYS Firearms Association

P.S.For decades, federal bureaucrats declared the United States Post Office a ‘Gun Free Zone.’

Now a federal court has ruled against their gun ban, the DOJ has abandoned the appeal defending it and said that lawful self-defense qualifies as justification to carry in the post office.

This fight is not over. Be careful where you carry. But it’s clear the legal walls around this gun ban are starting to come down — and we’ll keep you informed as this fight develops.