Gov. DeSantis signs permitless carry in Florida

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-Fla.) today signed into law a bill to allow permitless carry in Florida, according to Florida Voice.

What permitless carry means

Permitless carry means a Florida resident may carry a concealed weapon within Florida without a permit. But concealed-carry permits will still be available to those wishing to avail themselves of reciprocity agreements with other States.

The bill passed Florida’s House 76-32 and Florida’s Senate 27-13, thus achieving supermajorities in both chambers. Permitless carry will take effect July 1, 2023.

The new measure did not please everyone. At least two persons pointed out that permitless carry is not the same as Constitutional carry.

In fact the law requires any carrier to abide by current laws that forbid carrying firearms in “sensitive places.” These two users accuse Senator Collins of using the phrase “Constitutional carry” in a false and misleading manner. Nevertheless, Fox News makes much of Florida becoming the twenty-sixth State to allow permitless carry within its borders.

A gun-control advocate charged that the Nashville Incident happened after Tennessee “further loosened their gun laws with a similar bill.”

Do good guys with guns not always stop a shooter? Allegation out of Nashville

That last charge has its basis in an unverified claim that some person or persons, who called 911 after Audrey “Aidan” Hale invaded the Covenant School, said that some faculty and/or staff carried weapons of their own. Cam Edwards of the newsletter Bearing Arms said this in response:

[A]t this point we don’t know whether or not there actually was an armed staff member who was present, much less if or how they responded to the active shooter. If it was a teacher, for instance, they may have made the choice to shelter in place with their class, ready to defend the kids if the classroom door was breached. Clearly there were some security measures that prevented the killer from targeting more victims, given that 14 minutes elapsed between the first 911 calls and the moment she was shot and killed by responding officers, but we don’t know if armed school staff were among them.

Furthermore, the school would have needed a plan for whether and under what circumstances any armed employee(s) would challenge an active shooter. The “Run-Hide-Fight” protocol, common to workplace training, describes such a challenge as a last resort. Also, the 911 caller spoke only of “armed staff,” not a security guard trained to offer such a challenge.

“Moms Demand Action” seeks a regime in which no person, except a law-enforcement officer, an active-duty military service member, a Very Important Person or his bodyguard, shall own, carry, or so much as touch, much less discharge, a firearm.