New Coalition Challenges New Mexico’s Continued Seven-Day Waiting Period Enforcement

A coalition of gun-rights and firearms-industry organizations has filed a new challenge to New Mexico’s continued enforcement of its seven-day firearm waiting period. The dispute centers on who receives protection from earlier court decisions—and who remains subject to the law.

Bearing Arms reported October 20 that the National Shooting Sports Foundation, National Rifle Association, Second Amendment Foundation, New Mexico Firearms Industry Association and New Mexico Shooting Sports Association joined firearms dealers and an individual buyer in the case. The complaint is dated October 19. It asks for relief covering the plaintiffs and, where applicable, their members and customers.

The coalition says earlier litigation produced relief for two individual buyers while leaving other buyers and sellers exposed to enforcement. That distinction is the reason for the new suit. A court decision favoring particular plaintiffs does not, by itself, tell every other resident that enforcement against them has ended.

The complaint seeks an order declaring the waiting-period requirement unconstitutional for law-abiding buyers whose background checks clear in less than 72 hours, along with an injunction against enforcement covering the plaintiffs, their customers and their members. Those are requests to the court. The filing itself is not a new injunction, and this report does not establish that statewide enforcement has stopped.

For gun owners and dealers, the practical question is the scope of any order the court actually issues: which people and transactions it protects, and when that protection takes effect. Follow the court’s response rather than treating the announcement of a lawsuit as a change in purchase rules. Sign up for the WTF News newsletter for sourced updates on the case.