Last year it was uncovered that Black New Jersey permit-to-carry applicants were denied permits at more than double the rate of whites. A bill introduced would force reporting on this potential bias.
In May of 2024, after months of research and investigation, I was able to report that Black applicants for permits to carry in the Garden State are denied more than double their white counterparts. A bias watchdog group, Rise Against Hate, expanded on that reporting and when the data was normalized, they found that Blacks are denied at a rate of 10 times more than whites. The issue for New Jersey? These denials use illegal subjective standards. A bill was introduced that would force the state to report on these denials.
Bill A5964 was introduced by Assemblywoman Dawn Fantasia and Assemblyman Robert Auth. The information page for the bill states: “Requires Attorney General to compile and publicly report certain statistics pertaining to permits to carry a handgun and firearm purchaser identification cards.”
Looking at the bill text, it addresses much of the issues that have been highlighted here at Bearing Arms and Rise Against Hate. The bill puts a spotlight on the bias issues. It further addresses that subjective standards have been found unconstitutional through NYSRPA v. Bruen and asserts that “means-end tests concerning firearm regulations are not permissible.”
Following N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, 142 S.Ct. 2111 (2022), states may no longer use subjective standards when issuing licenses to possess or carry firearms by law-abiding citizens. In Bruen, the United States Supreme Court determined that means-end tests concerning firearm regulations are not permissible under the Second Amendment. The framework established in Bruen requires courts to determine whether modern firearm restrictions align with historical firearm regulations and are comparable to historical analogues.
In 2023 Attorney General Matthew Platkin directed issuing authorities to collect anonymized data on permit to carry applications. When the data was released in March of 2024, it coincided with data showing that so-called “gun violence” began to drop for the first time in years. It was further revealed that the majority of permit denials were under the verboten subjective standard and that applicants are inflicted with excessive waits. And lastly, the issue of racial bias was reported on showing a disparity on who do and don’t get issued permits.
The bill text specifically calls out the perceived disparity noting that “[s]tudies have shown that licensing criteria based on subjective standards lead to higher denial rates for applicants who are Black, indigenous, or otherwise people of color when compared to non-Hispanic, white applicants.” The text further notes that: “A recent independent study was conducted by the civil rights group Rise Against Hate regarding New Jersey firearms licensing outcomes. That study suggests that the rate of permits denied based on subjective standards currently contained in New Jersey statutory law is significantly higher for Black applicants.”
The bill, if it were to become law, would require monthly reporting on all firearm related paperwork from issuing authorities to the attorney general. Rightly so, the bill states that “If there are material differences in firearms licensing and permitting outcomes with respect to suspect classes, both the public and the Legislature should consider that data, and to the extent that a pattern exists, the government should inquire as to the root cause of those disparate outcomes.”
The reason behind any potential disparity needs to be rooted out. One of the biggest blights on all of these issuing authorities who are denying anyone a permit to carry, is that those individuals have already been vetted via the firearm identification card application process.
Those seeking carry permits can only do so after passing multiple background checks for both the procurement and possession of firearms. The standards on criminal history and eligibility are virtually identical for all New Jersey firearm related paperwork.
This bill is akin to the NICS Reporting Act which passed out of the U.S. House judiciary committee on a unanimous bipartisan vote.
Bill A5964 was introduced in the evening of June 30, 2025 and there are no listed co-sponsors at this time. Considering the gravity and topic of this potential law, getting bipartisan support should not be difficult.
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