Gun Groups Ask Full Ninth Circuit to Rehear California's 24-Hour Dealer Recording Law

The Goldwater Institute and a group led by the National Rifle Association filed briefs on October 23 backing a petition to have the full Ninth Circuit rehear Richards v. Newsom, the case that upheld California’s 24-hour gun dealer recording law. The plaintiffs filed the petition on October 13, according to the case docket. A petition for rehearing en banc asks all of the circuit’s active judges to reconsider a three-judge panel’s decision.

The law is California Penal Code section 26806, in effect since January 1, 2024. It requires every federally licensed firearms dealer, known as an FFL, to monitor its business premises with a digital video system that records 24 hours per day. Systems inside the premises must also record audio. The text is set out in the panel’s opinion.

The plaintiffs are the Second Amendment Foundation, Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners of California, Gun Owners Foundation, the California Rifle & Pistol Association, two businesses and four individuals. Two of the individuals, Adam Richards and Jeffrey Vandermeulen, run their dealer businesses out of their residences. Richards is an attorney who keeps a home office where he conducts his FFL business. They sued Governor Gavin Newsom and Attorney General Rob Bonta in December 2023, and District Judge James V. Selna dismissed the amended complaint.

The Legislature passed the mandate as Senate Bill 1384, which Newsom signed on September 30, 2022. The opinion cites ATF data showing 34,339 firearms were stolen from FFLs between 2017 and 2021, about 80 percent in burglaries.

Judges Kenneth K. Lee, Lucy H. Koh and Ana de Alba heard the appeal, and the opinion was filed August 27, 2026. Koh wrote it. Lee dissented in part, on the First and Fourth Amendment claims, and did not dispute the Fifth Amendment holding. The panel affirmed the dismissal for failure to state a claim.

On the Fourth Amendment, the panel held that the plaintiffs alleged no physical intrusion or access to recordings by the state. It also held that section 26806 does not itself authorize compliance inspections, which come from other statutes the plaintiffs did not challenge. Even if it did, the panel said, the statute would be valid on its face under New York v. Burger (1987), and nothing in the ruling prevents an FFL from challenging a specific search in the future.

Lee wrote that “The First Amendment shrivels under the constant surveillance of even a benevolent Big Brother.”

Bonta said in an August 28 release that the decision “confirms that we have the constitutional authority” to require recording systems at gun stores.

Goldwater’s amicus brief, a friend-of-the-court filing that all parties consented to, argues that the mandate is far more burdensome than a rule requiring security cameras. It says the panel erred in treating compelled recording as First Amendment-neutral until formal disclosure or retaliation occurs. It also says Rush v. Obledo (9th Cir. 1985), in which the court struck down unlimited warrantless inspections of home daycares, requires limits tied to the regulated activity, and that Burger does not erase that requirement.

The second brief was filed by the NRA, the America First Policy Institute and Knox Williams, president of the American Suppressor Association and an NRA board member. It argues that the law chills speech and association by lawful buyers and sellers, calling it an “Orwellian law” that “intentionally chills Second Amendment rights by trampling on the First Amendment.”

Under the appellate rules, the state files no response to the petition unless the court asks for one. As of October 27 the docket showed no order on the petition, and the recording requirement remains in effect.