There are still a few weeks left in the 2025 legislative session in Kansas, though lawmakers are on a break until April 10th. Before leaving Topeka last week, however, the Republican majority sent two bills to the desk of Democrat Gov. Laura Kelly, who now has to decide whether to veto the measures or allow them to become law.
The two bills are relatively modest in scope, in large part because Kansas already has pretty good laws in place. House Bill 2052 deals primarily with concealed carry for off-duty officers, and makes a common sense change to state statute allowing them to carry off-duty anywhere law enforcement can carry while they're officially on the job. Senate Bill 137 also is law-enforcement based in nature, though the bill could have an impact on gun buyers in the state. The legislation specificall allows law enforcement agencies sell off guns that were seized as part of a civil asset forfeiture proceeding to licensed gun dealers, rather that keeping them indefinitely or requiring them to be destroyed.
Both bills easily cleared the legislature with enough votes to override any potential veto by Kelly, but I could see the Democrat deciding to shoot down SB 137 anyway. Gun control groups have been working to require police departments across the country to destroy seized firearms rather than allow them to be auctioned off or sold to federally licensed firearm dealers, and Kelly may very well take her cue from those anti-2A organizations, even if her veto won't last for long.
As you might imagine, anti-gun activists had no luck with their own legislation in Kansas this year, though they're vowing to bring back several bills next session.
For the past three sessions, the gun violence prevention advocacy organization Moms Demand Action has supported a bill bolstering efforts to prevent children from accessing firearms. House Bill 2167 would require guns and stun guns to be locked in storage containers, and it would create a crime for failure to properly store a weapon where a child has access. Penalties would be greater for firearms with large-capacity magazines.
Shannon Little, the leader of the Kansas chapter of Moms Demand Action, said on the Kansas Reflector podcast that Kansas’ firearm laws are some of the weakest in the nation.
The organization’s safe storage bill was referred to the House Federal and State Affairs Committee, where rules allow anything introduced in an odd-numbered year to be brought up again the following session. The bill would penalize someone if an improperly stored firearm is used in a shooting.
“It would incentivize gun owners to responsibly store their firearms, and would definitely put the responsibility on secure firearm storage on adults and not kids,” she said.
No, it wouldn't incentivize gun owners to lock up their firearms. It would criminalize those who don't. If Moms Demand Action really wanted to encourage keeping guns under lock and key in homes where kids are present, they'd back measures to make it more affordable to purchase a gun safe, like tax credits or rebates. Instead, they're pushing a one-size-fits-all policy that removes parental choice from the equation.
Little also highlighted House Bill 2379, a proposal from Merriam Democrat Jarrod Ousley called the “voluntary do-not-sell firearms list” act. Its essence is suicide prevention, Little said.
Kansas has a higher firearm death rate than the national average, and suicides made up 67% of gun deaths in the state in 2023, according to data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The voluntary do-not-sell act would create an avenue for people to fill out paperwork to put themselves on a list that would prevent them from purchasing firearms. That paperwork would be available through health care providers and online.
Some kinks in the bill need to be ironed out, Ousley said, but he is operating within the parameters he’s politically allowed in Kansas instead of proposing a stricter red flag law, which exists in other states. Red flag laws, or extreme risk protection orders, allow authorities to temporarily seize someone’s firearms if they pose a risk to themselves or others. The provisions in Ousley’s bill make it so that any relinquishment of a firearm is completely voluntary.
“So it’s not infringing on their Second Amendment rights, aside from the safety precautions that they want to take on themselves,” she said.
Where's the "do not sell" list for liquor? How about a "do not prescribe" list for opioids? I understand the sentiment behind HB 2379, and if you're a regular reader here at Bearing Arms or watch/listen to the Cam & Co podcast you know I'm a big supporter of efforts to allow gun owners to temporarily store their collection with FFLs if they or someone in their home is going through a crisis. I don't have a huge issue with a do-not-sell law, other than the fact that guns are singled out when the bigger issue is mental health, but I can also say that Virginia already has this law in place and it's hardly used at all, so I also don't think it's particularly useful in terms of preventing suicide or self-harm.
If Kelly does end up vetoing one or both pro-2A bills that were approved last Friday we could see some Second Amendment fireworks in the waning days of the legislative session, but it looks like Jayhawk State gun owners can breathe easy this year when it comes to attacks on their right to keep and bear arms. Let's hope that doesn't lead to complacency, however, because the anti's are always looking to make inroads wherever and whenever they can.
