Six States Criminalize Red Flag Enforcement

Six states have banned enforcement of so-called 'extreme risk protection orders' — and some are hitting officials with criminal penalties if they try to enforce them anyway.

That's not a bug. That's the whole point.

Red flag laws — dressed up in bureaucratic language as 'ERPOs' — let courts strip law-abiding Americans of their firearms based on accusations alone. No crime committed. No conviction. No jury. Sometimes no notice to the gun owner at all. Just gone.

The Trace — an anti-gun advocacy outlet masquerading as journalism — is wringing its hands over states that refuse to participate in this constitutional end-run. Their newsletter frames ERPO bans as dangerous and extreme. What's actually dangerous and extreme is seizing a citizen's firearms without due process.

The Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments exist for a reason. 'Shall not be infringed' exists for a reason. These six states read both.

The Trace also trots out the claim that concerns about ERPO abuse are 'false.' Tell that to gun owners who've had their doors kicked in at 5 a.m. over an ex-partner's phone call. Due process violations aren't theoretical — they're documented.

It's worth noting that Donald Trump briefly endorsed red flag laws after Parkland in 2018 — a rare stumble that gun owners pushed back on hard. The NRA flirted with support before reading the room. The Second Amendment community held the line, and today that pressure is bearing fruit in statehouses across the country.

The momentum is real. When states start criminalizing enforcement of unconstitutional orders, the political landscape has shifted. Lawmakers in these six states didn't just vote no — they built a firewall.

The fight isn't over. Anti-gun legislators and activist groups will keep pushing ERPOs as a 'common sense' solution to criminal violence. Don't buy it. No law that strips your rights before you've done anything wrong deserves that label.

Know your state's laws on red flag orders — and if your state still has one on the books, find your legislators and make some noise.