WA Gun Rights

Going to have some new content coming up soon!

From StormCloudsGathering’s channel.  While I may not agree with all of the information, it is still a reminder that we are in charge, and can still change the course that we are headed down.  As someone who could be called an “enemy combatant” because of my views and the fact that I own weapons, I implore you to at least listen and judge for yourself.  When Senator Graham stands in front of the senate and says “when they say I want my lawyer, you tell them shut up, you don’t get a lawyer, you’re are an enemy combatant.” people need to listen, understand and start taking action before they too are declared an “enemy combatant” and disappear.  This video has been re-uploaded to my youtube channel, found here.

    There are several misconceptions that I hear every day from people who own guns in Washington State. They range from understandable to wildly dramatic to wanting to straight up smack someone. I am going to attempt to answer some of those questions here. I feel that it is important to not only educate people, but give them the best information possible. First and foremost, working in the firearm industry, and dealing with people that carry on a daily basis I run into a lot of people that don’t even know where they cannot carry a firearm in public. This one always makes me stop and wonder, then how are they carrying and are they not carrying in places that they can, or worse carrying in places off limits by law.

1. Where Can/Can’t I carry a firearm

This question is easiest to answer by covering the “cannot” side of things. Places that are off limits to a firearm are pretty black and white here in Washington State. The RCW for this is 9.41.300 and it covers all the places that you are prohibited from carrying a weapon, with the exception of one.

• Restricted access portion of a jail or police department.
  • Anyplace used for the confinement of a prisoner. These are not common access areas.
• Court Houses, which defines any place there are court proceedings and areas used to conduct court business.
  • Courts are supposed to, by law, have lock boxes or a means of checking a legally carried firearm.
• Restricted areas of mental health facilities.
• Any place that is posted with liquor control board signage prohibiting minors.
  • This does not include restaurants that serve alcohol, just the bar portion. You may carry a weapon into someplace like Red Robin or Applebee’s and sit in the restaurant portion.
• Secure area of airports. So any place past the screening point is a no-go. Anyplace before the security checkpoints is ok, like check in area, baggage claim, parking garage etc….
• Schools buildings or places designated solely for a school function.
  • So if the school rents out the aquarium for a dance, and the general public is excluded from entry, then carry would be prohibited. If there is just a field trip and the aquarium is still open to the public, carry would be allowed.
  • With a valid Washington State CPL you can carry while dropping off a student at school, and lock a firearm in your car (glove box, lock box) out of sight on school grounds.
• Federal Buildings.

These are the places that you cannot carry a firearm. Any place else that you come across is ok. Parks and municipal buildings sometimes will have no firearm signs, but because of 9.41.290 (State Preemption) you can carry a firearm there without breaking any laws, as long as they are not one of the prohibited places. Private business will also put up no-firearms signs, other times they will not put up signs, but make policy on the fly. A private business in Washington State can only ask you to leave if you are discovered to have a firearm. At that point, if you refuse you can be trespassed and charged, with trespassing, not a weapons violation. I will delve into state preemption soon, as it will take up its own blog post or two. Stay tuned if you are looking for more information on state preemption.

1. A gun purchased is registered to me! If I buy a firearm from someone I need to register it!

This is a pretty common misconception. First, let me put it like this. WASHINGTON STATE DOES NOT HAVE A REGISTRATION. There, now that’s out there. This really end up being a two prong misconception. If you buy a hand gun from a Federal Firearms Licensed dealer, you will fill out a pistol transfer form. This form is required by the state to transfer the pistol to you. It is not putting the gun in your name. It is not a registration.

Many times I also hear people say “if my gun is stolen, it’s tied to me if the commit a crime.” While this is not only untrue, it is a misconception that the gun is tied to you. Yes, if the ATF can look up the serial number it will show as sold to you by a FFL because your name and the serial number are on the Form 4473. If you had a gun stolen, I would hope that you would have filed a police report stating that. This is your best defense against the ATF if they were to knock on your door. The best way to deal with that is to step outside, shut the door to your house. Advise them that you can talk to them outside, and they are not welcome to come in without a warrant. At that time tell them the firearm was stolen on ____ date. Advise them you have a police report stating as such. Go back inside, ALONE, get the police report and produce it for them. Do not let them take it, if you have the ability, make them a copy. If not, they can write down the case number and get their own copy of the report. Giving them your copy means that you will now have to get another copy, which can take time and during this time you have no report showing the firearm was stolen. This will satisfy their inquiry into the weapon, and will not hear from them again about the matter.

On the other side of this is selling and purchasing firearms private party. In Washington State you can sell a firearm to anyone that is legally able to possess a firearm at any time, for any amount of money. So that shotgun you bought last year and never used? You can sell that to someone and make some money out of it. The easiest way to do this is to ask them to see their CPL if they have one. While not required, it will give you peace of mind that they are allowed to possess a weapon. Many people will also do a bill of sale with the seller’s info, buyer’s info and firearm info. This will go into their records just in case the ATF was ever to knock on their door about the firearm. Again, this is not required to sell a firearm to a private party. Once the firearm is sold, you are done. Keep in mind here, you cannot go to a police station to have them transfer the weapon. The police will not run the other person or the firearm for you. Not only is it a waste of their time, it is also illegal for them to do. Another thing to keep in mind is that a gun store will not do the paperwork for you. They have a business to run, and are not interested in getting involved in private party transfers.

While not something that I advocate, there is a Washington Department of Licensing form that you can fill out that is called a Pistol/Revolver Private Disposition/Transfer. You can fill this out, have both partied sign it and mail it is. This form is voluntary, and does not need to be filled out as there is not necessarily a record of you buying the handgun in the first place. Many people that deal in firearms choose to keep the government out of their lives and gun safes. I will never buy a firearm from anyone that will be requiring a transfer form to mail in, period…end of story. There are plenty of other guns out there with reasonable people selling them that don’t need to get everyone and their cousin involved with the sale of a firearm.

Stay tuned for more WA State firearm myths that I see and deal with quite often…. Including open carry, carrying a firearm in your car and state preemption as well as many more! If you have a topic or question or misconception that you get send it my way and I will research and put up a blog post about it!