Green Beret Congressman: SOF Warriors Shouldn't Beg for Carry Permits

Congressman Pat Harrigan (NC-10), a Special Forces veteran, dropped the Special Operations Forces Concealed Carry Act this week. The bill extends federal concealed carry authority to both active-duty and veteran SOF personnel—coast to coast, no state sign-off required.

Think about what that means in practice. These operators qualify repeatedly on weapons systems most police departments have never touched. They make life-or-death trigger decisions in the dark, in foreign countries, under conditions no licensing board has ever imagined. Then they land back on American soil—and in California, New York, or New Jersey, they stand in the same line as everyone else, hat in hand, waiting for some bureaucrat to decide if they're qualified.

**That's not a technicality. That's a national disgrace.**

Harrigan's bill is modeled directly on the Law Enforcement Officers Safety Act—LEOSA—which already grants qualified current and retired law enforcement federal carry authority across state lines. SOF veterans have been frozen out of that framework for years, despite training credentials that make most officer qualifications look like a weekend course.

This isn't a loophole. It isn't a workaround. It is the federal government being asked to match its words with its actions: if Washington trusts these operators to execute the most sensitive missions on the planet, no anti-gun governor gets to strip their carry rights the moment they cross a state border.

Harrigan said it straight—the men and women of special operations have earned the right to defend themselves and their families anywhere in this country. He's right. Full stop.

**The question now is whether Congress has the spine to say the same thing out loud.**

The bill needs co-sponsors and momentum. Contact your representative today and demand they sign on to the Special Operations Forces Concealed Carry Act. And if they won't stand up for the warriors who carried a rifle for this country—make sure every gun owner in their district knows exactly where they stood before the next election.