FPC Sues Los Angeles and Inglewood Over Handgun Rationing Bans the Ninth Circuit Already Killed
Key Takeaways
- The Firearms Policy Coalition is suing Los Angeles and Inglewood for laws limiting handgun purchases to one per month.
- Plaintiff Thomas Lopez argues these local ordinances violate the Second Amendment, especially after the Ninth Circuit struck down a similar state law.
- The lawsuit also challenges a one-way fee-shifting law that penalizes individuals who sue over gun regulations.
- The plaintiffs seek to declare the city ordinances unconstitutional and prohibit their enforcement while claiming nominal damages.
- FPC President Brandon Combs emphasizes the importance of respecting the Second Amendment in the case against these cities.
Estimated reading time: 4 minutes
LOS ANGELES, CA — The Firearms Policy Coalition is taking Los Angeles and Inglewood to federal court over local laws that ration how often a law-abiding citizen can buy a handgun.
FPC, the California Gun Rights Foundation, and an individual member named Thomas Lopez filed the lawsuit on June 3, 2026, in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. The case is called Lopez v. City of Los Angeles.
Both cities enforce ordinances that bar any person from buying more than one handgun in a 30-day period. Los Angeles codifies its version at LAMC Section 55.14. Inglewood’s lives at Municipal Code Section 5-19.6. Neither offers a path for an ordinary citizen who wants to buy two handguns in the same month for self-defense or any other lawful reason.
Here is what makes this filing strong. The Ninth Circuit already struck down California’s statewide one-gun-a-month law. In Nguyen v. Bonta, decided in 2025, the court ruled that restriction facially unconstitutional. It held the Second Amendment protects the right to own multiple firearms and to acquire them without meaningful constraint, and that no historical tradition supports a cap on how often citizens may buy.
The complaint argues the LA and Inglewood ordinances impose the same restriction on the same conduct for the same reasons. Both cities passed their bans years before the state adopted its own. When the Ninth Circuit knocked down the state law, those local ordinances did not disappear. They remain on the books, and the cities have given no sign they will stop enforcing them.
That is the whole point of the case. A court striking the state law does not automatically reach a city ordinance that says the same thing. So the plaintiffs are asking a federal judge to finish the job.
The named plaintiff is no fringe figure. Thomas Lopez is 26 and lives in La Verne. He serves in the California National Guard and spent five years on active duty in the Army as an infantryman. He holds an active secret security clearance and a North Carolina concealed carry permit valid through 2028. He has no criminal record and no disqualifying mental health history. He could pass any background check.
Lopez says he is ready and financially able to buy more than one handgun this month from dealers in Los Angeles and Inglewood, including models made by Canik and Walther. The ordinances are the only thing stopping him. If he tried, each handgun application would count as a separate violation, with penalties climbing from fines to a misdemeanor.
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The lawsuit also takes aim at a second California law. Code of Civil Procedure Section 1021.11, which came out of SB 1327, sets up a one-way fee-shifting penalty aimed only at people who challenge gun laws. It lets government defendants collect attorney fees if they win on any claim, while denying that same status to the citizens who sue. A federal court already found that statute unconstitutional in Miller v. Bonta. The plaintiffs want it cleared out of the way before their main claims proceed.
FPC President Brandon Combs said the cities are enforcing bans the Ninth Circuit already rejected, and that the group filed this case to “force these cities to respect the Second Amendment, full stop.”
The plaintiffs are represented by Chad Flores of Flores Law PLLC and David Bartels of Lawrence Bartels LLP. They are asking the court to declare both ordinances unconstitutional, permanently block enforcement, and award nominal damages and fees. The complaint names the City of Los Angeles, Police Chief James McDonnell, and City Attorney Hydee Feldstein Soto, along with the City of Inglewood, Police Chief Mark Fronterotta, and City Attorney Rick Olivarez.
The right to keep and bear arms includes the right to acquire them. A city cannot meter that right one purchase at a time any more than it could limit speech to one statement a month. These bans should fall, and this case hands a federal court a clean shot to make that happen.
I will keep tracking Lopez v. City of Los Angeles as it moves through the Central District of California.
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