Second Amendment Protection Act Passes Wyoming Committee
A gun-rights bill that would exempt Wyoming officials and law enforcement agencies from enforcing federal gun control laws violating the Second Amendment has passed a legislative committee and is headed to the Wyoming Senate.
The Senate Judiciary Committee on Monday voted 4-0 in favor of the bill. You can read Senate File 102 here.
While the measure is designed to protect gun ownership in Wyoming, some gun rights activists consider the measure as weak compared with Senate File 87/House Bill 133, the Second Amendment Preservation Act, which failed to pass introduction votes in both houses of the Wyoming Legislature last week.
Supporters of that legislation say Senate File 102 is flawed because it doesn't name specific acts that would be deemed as unconstitutional and because state officials are only barred from using state funds to enforce federal gun control laws, but could still enforce those laws using federal money. Wyoming law enforcement officials in 2021 came out against similar legislation to Senate File 87 in 2021, in part because of concerns that the legislation would remove qualified immunity from Wyoming law enforcement officers under some circumstances.
All of the state's 23 county sheriffs signed a letter opposing the 2021 bill that was similar to this year's Senate File 87.
In Judiciary Committee discussion of Senate File 102 on Monday. Byron Oedekoven, the former Sheriff of Campbell County who is now a lobbyist for the Wyoming Association of Sheriffs And Chiefs Of Police [WASCOP] spoke in favor of the bill.
Oedekoven said the legislation ''looks to prohibit law enforcement, or anyone else for that matter, from taking any action on any unconstitutional attempts to infringe on the Second Amendment. So it likewise leaves in place the federal legislation that is constitutional.''
Senate File 102 now faces three readings in the Wyoming Senate. If the Senate signs off on the legislation, it would then move on to the Wyoming House of Representatives.