DOJ Surrenders in 41 Words — Post Office Gun Ban Dead
SAF & FPC's permanent injunction stands after DOJ files the lamest dismissal motion in 2A history — zero explanation, zero defense.
- The federal ban on carrying at post offices and postal parking lots is permanently enjoined — DOJ will not revive it.
- DOJ's 41-word no-explanation dismissal signals the government has no viable post-Bruen argument left to make on 'sensitive places' at routine federal property.
- The *Wolford* precedent cited by SAF signals courts are tightening the definition of 'sensitive places' — making future federal carry bans harder to sustain.
- Licensed carriers can now legally carry at post offices and keep firearms locked in their vehicles on postal property without fear of federal prosecution.
The Department of Justice filed a 41-word motion on July 16 to walk away from its appeal defending the federal post office gun ban — and offered zero explanation for the surrender.
No argument. No counterproposal. Just a request to dismiss, with each side covering its own costs. The government that spent two years fighting to disarm you in a parking lot outside a post office couldn't even write a paragraph defending why.
The case is *Firearms Policy Coalition v. Blanche* — named after Acting AG Todd Blanche, who decided this hill wasn't worth dying on. The Fifth Circuit must formally grant the dismissal, but with no opposition filed, it's finished. The permanent injunction secured by SAF and FPC stands.
"We now have finality and clarity that the hard-fought injunction we secured on behalf of our members, striking down the post office carry ban, is the permanent outcome of the case," said SAF Senior Director of Legal Operations Bill Sack.
That injunction, handed down September 30, 2025 by Chief U.S. District Judge Reed O'Connor, struck down both the federal statute (18 U.S.C. § 930(a)) and the postal regulation (39 C.F.R. § 232.1(l)) that banned carry inside post offices and on surrounding postal property — including parking lots. Under the old rules, a licensed carrier couldn't even leave a firearm locked in their car before walking inside.
O'Connor's ruling was blunt: the government "as a property owner must abide by Bruen's Second Amendment analysis." Owning the deed does not let Washington suspend the Bill of Rights.
Sack pointed to the recent *Wolford* decision as likely sealing the deal — another court rejecting the government's attempt to stretch "sensitive places" doctrine into a blanket excuse to disarm Americans anywhere federal employees work.
The historical record was equally damning. The American postal system predates the Constitution. The Founders knew mail carriers got robbed and attacked. Their answer was to punish the criminals — not disarm every peaceable citizen who needed a stamp.
This is a clean, final win. SAF and FPC members at ordinary post offices are now permanently protected from these restrictions. And every federal attorney still pushing the "sensitive place" theory just watched DOJ fold rather than defend it before the Fifth Circuit.
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