Few communities take the products they use as seriously as gun owners. A firearm is often a tool that a person needs to be able to trust their life with. Add brand loyalty and differences of opinion on design, ergonomics, function, calibers, and aesthetics and there are the makings for passionate debate.
But as these debates rage, gun owners shouldn’t lose sight of the bigger picture. Gun ownership and the firearms industry in the U.S. are under constant political attack. Understanding this, gun rights supporters must approach litigation against the firearms industry with a discerning eye.
Gun control supporters have long viewed costly litigation against the firearms industry as a tactic in their overarching strategy to disarm the American public.
In the mid-1990s, gun control advocates, big city politicians, and trial attorneys teamed up to use the courts to bilk the gun industry for millions and force them to agree to gun control measures that gun control supporters were unable to enact in Congress. The lawsuits sought to hold members of the industry liable for the criminal behavior of those who misused their products.
These suits, though without legal merit, posed a grave threat to the industry – and in turn, American gun owners and their ability to exercise their Second Amendment rights. In 1998, the executive director of the anti-gun U.S. Conference of Mayors was quoted by the New York Times as stating, “[t]he lawyers are seeing green on this issue… they think they can bring the gun industry to its knees.” One of those attorneys “seeing green,” John Coale, was quoted in a 2000 Washington Post article remarking, “[t]he legal fees alone are enough to bankrupt the industry.”
In 2005, Congress passed and George W. Bush signed the bipartisan Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA). The PLCAA prohibits lawsuits against the gun industry for the criminal misuse of their products by a third party.
Such a federal law shouldn’t even be necessary.
The PLCAA was enacted to codify a longstanding principle of tort law that gun control advocates sought to erode. U.S. tort law has long held that a person or entity cannot be held responsible for a third party’s criminal acts. Simply put: people are responsible for their own behavior, not the behavior of others. Therefore, if a violent criminal acquires and misuses a firearm to commit a crime, it is the criminal who is liable for the conduct, not the company that produced the firearm. Just like how Chevrolet isn’t responsible for the actions of drunk drivers.
Suits against the firearms industry for knowingly unlawful sales, negligent entrustment, and those predicated on traditional products liability grounds are still permitted under the PLCAA.
In the wake of the PLCAA, gun control advocates have attempted to use products liability cases to target the industry.
Consider the case Gustafson v. Springfield. In 2018, attorneys for the plaintiffs, including counsel for Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, filed suit against gunmaker Springfield in Pennsylvania. The suit alleged that Springfield’s XD-9 semiautomatic handgun had a defective design because the firearm did not incorporate a magazine disconnect, which would not allow the firearm to be fired if the magazine was removed.
Not having a magazine disconnect is not a “design defect,” as the suit alleged. Some semi-automatic firearms have them, and some do not. For those who desire this feature, they can purchase a firearm with it. Many gun owners don’t want the added complexity and do want a firearm that’s capable of firing if the magazine is dislodged during the tense moments of a defensive gun use.
After seven years of litigation, the case made it all the way up to the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania, who ruled for Springfield in 2025.
Brady’s early involvement in the case demonstrates that gun control advocates view products liability litigation as just another means to pursue their political ends. Of note is that counsel for Brady listed in the initial suit included longtime gun control advocate Jonathan Lowy.
Lowy went on to lead the group Global Action on Gun Violence and orchestrate Mexico’s frivolous liability suit against the American gun industry in Smith & Wesson Brands, Inc. v. Estados Unidos Mexicanos (2025). According to a 2022 Politico article, Lowy and his group registered with the federal government “as agents of Mexico” to pursue the case. In June, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled against Mexico and its U.S. anti-gun collaborators 9-0.
Another item to consider is an August 2023 report from the University of California Berkeley School of Law Civil Justice Research Initiative titled, “Civil Litigation as a Tool in a Public Health Approach to Gun Violence.” The title alone demonstrates a post-PLCAA campaign to continue to use litigation to impact the gun industry for political ends.
The document is something of a roadmap for getting around the PLCAA to continue the anti-gun litigation campaign. The goal, in part, is to “circumvent” the PLCAA using “defective design” litigation, as the document points out: “Claims based on negligent marketing (as opposed to strict liability or defective design, for example) have historically been the most successful at circumventing PLCAA and proceeding in court.”
How far do the authors admit they want to go? The item states,
Civil litigation against the gun industry might help overcome the limited capacity of lawmakers and administrative agencies to regulate guns… The threat of liability can hold the gun industry accountable by providing a powerful incentive to ensure that its products are manufactured and distributed safely. For example, gun manufacturers could adopt design changes, such as self-locking mechanisms or face and fingerprint recognition technology…
A law firm that has sued Sig Sauer in relation to the P320 is Saltz Mongeluzzi Bendesky. Firm partner Robert Zimmerman is the chair of the American Association for Justice’s (formerly Association of Trial Lawyers of America) Firearms Litigation Group.
One of the authors of the UC Berkeley report cited above is Robert S. Peck, who the report noted is “a Leaders Forum member of the American Association for Justice.”
To illustrate the political leanings of AAJ, OpenSecrets.org reported that during the 2024 election cycle over 95-percent of the group’s contributions to federal candidates went to Democrats. A July 2016 Washington Post article titled “Lobbyists have raised $7 million for Hillary Clinton. For Trump? Zero,” explained,
About a third of the $7 million — roughly $2.4 million — for Clinton was bundled by a handful of veteran Democratic lobbyists. This list includes some of K Street’s premier fundraisers, who represent a broad range of industries and Fortune 500 companies. Most are top partners or founders of prominent lobby firms, while one is the leader of an influential trial lawyers group. They are:
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Linda Lipsen, who raised $320,000 for the campaign and $144,000 for the victory fund
…
Lipsen, the longtime top lobbyist for the American Association of Justice — previously known as the Association of Trial Lawyers of America — became the group’s CEO in 2010.
In 2021, Lipsen expressed her support for the ill-named federal “Firearm Owners Responsibility and Safety Act” (H.R.4836). The legislation would have mandated firearm storage requirements throughout homes nationwide and repealed the PLCAA. Lipsen stated, “Among other commonsense reforms, the Firearm Owners Responsibility and Safety Act rightfully restores the ability of victims to hold manufacturers, distributors, dealers, and importers of firearms or ammunition responsible when negligent sales lead to harm or death.” Note the “among other commonsense reforms” suggests the lobbyist supports gun control measures beyond her group and its members’ immediate pecuniary interests.
Astute gun right supporters will know of the Giffords gun control organization (formerly Americans for Responsibly Solutions and the Second Amendment-denying Legal Community Against Violence). There is an employee listed on their website as a “State and Local Policy Attorney”, who “drafts and analyzes state level legislation and works with lawmakers and advocates across the country to enact policies preventing all forms of gun violence.” According to the Giffords website, this individual was previously “counsel for the American Association for Justice, where he worked on legislative efforts to ensure accountability within the firearm industry.”
Robust interest in and debate over the merits and demerits of various firearms is a vibrant aspect of the firearms community. Moreover, there could be firearms, just like all other products, that suffer from actual design or manufacturing defects. However, given the politics around firearm ownership and the firearms industry, and gun control advocates’ observed willingness to use the courts to secure otherwise unobtainable policy outcomes, gun owners should approach product liability suits against the gun industry with a discerning eye and the full political context in mind.
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