{"id":21934,"date":"2025-06-06T10:10:21","date_gmt":"2025-06-06T16:10:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-law-requiring-people-buying-guns-to-be-21-or-older-can-stand-federal-judge-rules\/"},"modified":"2025-06-06T16:10:21","modified_gmt":"2025-06-06T16:10:21","slug":"colorado-law-requiring-people-buying-guns-to-be-21-or-older-can-stand-federal-judge-rules","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorado-law-requiring-people-buying-guns-to-be-21-or-older-can-stand-federal-judge-rules\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado law requiring people buying guns to be 21 or older can stand, federal judge rules"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"From
From top: An MCX-R, AR-15 and M-4 Carbine for sale at Bristlecone Shooting, Training and Retail Center in Lakewood on Jan. 16. The Colorado Legislature is considering a bill that would ban the manufacture, purchase and sale of semiautomatic rifles and shotguns that are capable of accepting detachable ammunition magazines, as well as some semiautomatic pistols and handguns. All three weapons in this photo couldn\u2019t be manufactured, sold or purchased in Colorado if Senate Bill 3 passes. (Jesse Paul\/The Colorado Sun)<\/span>cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Colorado\u2019s law requiring people to be at least 21 years old to buy a gun can stand, a federal judge ruled Thursday.<\/p>\n

The ruling is a definitive win for gun control advocates and a blow to the group Rocky Mountain Gun Owners and two young people hoping to purchase guns, who sued Gov. Jared Polis to block the law in 2023. Chief U.S. District Judge Philip A. Brimmer sided with Polis and said in his ruling that the plaintiffs could not prove that the law violated their rights.<\/p>\n

\u201cPlaintiffs cannot establish a violation of a right secured by the Constitution or that they have suffered an irreparable injury from such a violation,\u201d Brimmer wrote.<\/p>\n

The law, passed in 2023, changed the minimum age to purchase all guns in Colorado to 21 from 18 and added criminal penalties for purchasers and firearm sellers.<\/p>\n

Federal law already bans the purchase of handguns from licensed dealers by people under 21, but allows younger people to purchase other kinds of guns. The federal 21-year-old age requirement is being challenged, though.<\/p>\n

Supporters of the Colorado law argued that the age restriction will reduce youth suicides, accidental shootings and gun violence. Eight states, including Colorado, have raised the age to purchase guns to 21, according to data from Everytown, a gun control advocacy organization.<\/p>\n

Firearms are the leading cause of death among children and teens.<\/p>\n

Eric Maruyama, a spokesperson for Polis, said the governor is \u201cconfident this law has and will help keep Coloradans and our communities safe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Rocky Mountain Gun Owners and the two young people interested in purchasing guns immediately challenged the Colorado law in federal court in 2023. Brimmer initially agreed they had enough of a case to prevent the law from taking effect, granting them a temporary injunction that year. Then, Polis appealed to the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, which lifted the injunction in November and allowed the law to go into effect while Brimmer considered the merits of the case.<\/p>\n

On Thursday, Brimmer ruled against the gun rights group.<\/p>\n

Rocky Mountain Gun Owners executive director Ian Escalante called Thursday\u2019s ruling \u201cdisgraceful\u201d and said he is consulting with his legal team about whether the group will appeal the ruling.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s obviously an activist judge\u2019s ruling,\u201d Escalante said.<\/p>\n

Brimmer was appointed by former President George W. Bush, a Republican.<\/p>\n

Janet Carter, managing director of Second Amendment litigation at Everytown Law, the gun control advocacy group, said the ruling \u201cwill make Coloradans safer.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cProhibiting 18-20 year olds from purchasing firearms is a common sense, data-backed tool for preventing gun violence,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd it\u2019s entirely constitutional.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Colorado Sun is a reader-supported, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to covering Colorado issues. To learn more, go to coloradosun.com<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

a U.S. district judge is a win for gun-control advocates<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":21935,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[394,233,150,819,28,107,1373,2310],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-21934","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-colorado-legislature","tag-coloradosun-com","tag-firearms","tag-gov-jared-polis","tag-headlines","tag-laws","tag-litigation","tag-weaponry"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21934","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21934"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21934\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21935"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21934"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21934"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21934"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=21934"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}