The Florida House is for the third time pushing to undo a law that bans people younger than 21 from buying a rifle.
In the past two legislative sessions, the bill failed amid opposition from Senate President Kathleen Passidomo.
But this year, gun rights activists say they’re more hopeful, pointing to new legislative leadership, a court ruling and continued support from Gov. Ron DeSantis.
Here’s what to know about the proposal and what it would mean for Floridians.
Why does Florida’s law restrict people under 21 from buying rifles?
The law was a direct result of the 2018 Parkland shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, where 17 students and teachers died.
The gunman was a 19-year-old who used an AR-15-style rifle that he’d legally purchased about a year earlier.
The school shooting, one of the deadliest in U.S. history, happened in the middle of Florida’s legislative session. Family members of the dead begged lawmakers for change. The result was a sweeping bipartisan gun and school safety package that Gov. Rick Scott signed into law.
The National Rifle Association opposed the bill and quickly challenged the requirement that someone be 21 to buy a long gun. Federal law already required that someone be at least 21 years old to buy a handgun.
What’s still allowed under the current law?
Florida’s law only bans the sale or transfer of a firearm by any licensed gun dealer or manufacturer to someone younger than 21.
Federal law already prohibits the sale of handguns to someone younger than 21, but allows people to purchase a rifle or long gun if they are at least 18.
People under 21 can still possess and use rifles if they lawfully get the firearm another way, like having it gifted to them.
The law also allows people 18, 19 and 20 to purchase rifles if they are a law enforcement officer, correctional officer or service member.
A service member is defined as any person serving as part of the United States Armed Forces on active duty or state active duty, anyone in the Florida National Guard, and anyone in the United States Reserve Forces.
What have the courts said?
The National Rifle Association quickly challenged Florida’s law after it was passed in 2018, arguing that the restriction violated the Second Amendment right to bear arms and the Fourteenth Amendment right to equal protection.
In 2023, a federal appeals court upheld Florida’s law, saying that it was consistent with historical firearms restrictions.
On Friday, an appeals court reaffirmed that the under-21 restriction was valid.
“From the Founding to the late-nineteenth century, our law limited the purchase of firearms by minors in different ways,” the court wrote. “The Florida law also limits the purchase of firearms by minors. And it does so for the same reason: to stop immature and impulsive individuals, like Nikolas Cruz, from harming themselves and others with deadly weapons.”
The decision was supported by eight judges on the court, including five judges appointed by a Democrat president and three justices appointed by a Republican president. Four judges, all appointed by President Donald Trump, dissented.
The decision sets up a possible challenge that could run up to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Earlier this year, a different appeals court ruled that a federal age restriction on firearms was unconstitutional.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier on Friday made clear he disagrees with Florida’s age restriction. He said on social media that if Florida’s case moves to the Supreme Court, he and his office would not defend the law (unlike his predecessor Ashley Moody).
Are younger people more likely to use guns?
Perpetrators of gun violence are more likely to be young men, with the peak age being 18, said Daniel Webster, a distinguished scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions.
But Webster noted that gun violence is “a handgun problem more than it is anything else.”
Webster, citing data from the FBI’s National Incident-Based Reporting System for murder and non-negligent manslaughter, noted that arrests hit their highest for 18-year-olds, and then fall for each subsequent age group.
Webster said that the prefrontal cortex, which plays a large role in decision-making, isn’t developed until about age 25 for males, which he said helps explain the age distribution for violent crime.
Pinellas County Sheriff Bob Gualtieri said the idea behind restricting the purchase of long guns is to provide “speed bumps” for people who are 18, 19 or 20.
Gualtieri, chairperson of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School Public Safety Commission, said people in that age range tend to be impulsive, and that the current laws stops people from buying a rifle on impulse.
“There’s nothing in there that prevents a 19-year-old from possessing a rifle or a shotgun,” Gualtieri said.
Where do legislative leaders stand?
House Speaker Daniel Perez, R-Miami, has said he supports the bill to lower the rifle-buying age to 18. Perez voted for the post-Parkland bill in 2018 that made the change, saying it was a “very emotional time” and that the Legislature was trying to prevent a similar tragedy from happening again.
“And because of that, government has gotten involved with the Second Amendment,” Perez said earlier this month.
Senate President Ben Albritton, R-Wauchula, has said he’s thinking through the proposal, but he has not yet indicated if he’s for it or against it.
