Pennsylvania Attorney General Kathleen Kane has indicated that she won’t stand for the state to defend in court a challenge filed by three cities and five legislators opposed to the recently adopted firearms preemption that expands the rights of groups like the National Rifle Association to challenge local gun ordinances in cities and towns across the state.
For Kane, it’s a return to a strategy she employed with great fanfare in 2013, when she held a Philadelphia press conference to announce her decision not to defend the law defining marriage in Pennsylvania as between one man and one woman, the Harrisburg Patriot News reported.
The challenged law, which Gov. Tom Corbett signed this fall, gives aggrieved gunowners or any member organization they belong to standing to sue any municipalities with gun restrictions that exceed those passed by the state Legislature and signed by a governor.
The new law was challenged in Commonwealth Court in November by a group of Democratic legislators and the cities of Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Lancaster, each of which has adopted some form of local gun ordinance that is more restrictive than state law.
Kane’s office did not issue a release on the latest decision—first reported by Philly.com. But a spokesman told the Patriot News that Kane had “determined it would be more efficient and in the best interest of the Commonwealth for the (governor’s) Office of General Counsel to handle this matter.”
With Kane bowing out of the case, the law can be defended by the governor’s office and attorneys representing the Republican-dominated General Assembly. Drew Crompton, counsel for the Senate Republicans, confirmed to the newspaper that Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati (R-Jefferson County) would make sure that the act is defended.
The act in question is designed to give gunowners a powerful new tool to take legal challenges to any of the scores of cities and towns, including Harrisburg, Lancaster and York, that have adopted local gun laws.
