Pennsylvania gun owners could find themselves facing a hopeless hodgepodge of surprise restrictions if a state lawmaker has his way.
Democratic Pennsylvania state Rep. Dan Frankel introduced HB 2506 Monday, which would wipe out the state’s firearms preemption law, allowing local governments to enact their own restrictions on how gun owners could carry, transport, purchase or possess firearms. The legislation, introduced alongside HB 2505, also would repeal the state’s version of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, potentially opening gun manufacturers to lawsuits over the actions of criminals.
“Both of these bills, HB 2505 and HB 2506, would create a patchwork quilt of gun control laws across Pennsylvania ensnaring law-abiding gun owners, and it would open up the floodgates for municipalities to sue the firearms industry out of existence,” Gun Owners of America Pennsylvania lobbyist Val Finnell told the Daily Caller News Foundation.
National Shooting Sports Foundation spokesman Mark Oliva told the DCNF that the legislation’s provisions were “nonstarters.”
“This legislation would only create a series of legal land mines for gun owners in the Commonwealth,” Oliva said. “Additionally, the provision to strike the law that prohibits frivolous lawsuits against the firearm industry would open the courts for lawfare. Pennsylvania’s legislators should focus on holding the criminals accountable for their crimes and protecting its citizens and their fundamental rights.”
ALERT
The Senate has passed Senate Bill 822 to strengthen Pennsylvania’s firearms preemption law pushing back on rogue municipalities for violating your gun rights!
The vote was 30 to 20! Several Democrats broke ranks and sided with the Republicans to pass this bill!… pic.twitter.com/AcKWxz7Ht4
— Pennsylvania Gun Rights (@PennGunRights) May 6, 2026
ALERT In a co-sponsorship memo sent regarding the legislation, Frankel claimed the state’s preemption laws prevented Pittsburgh and Philadelphia from protecting public safety. Frankel’s office referred the DCNF to the memo when reached for comment.
“Our communities in Pennsylvania are barred from doing anything at all to prevent gun violence,” the memo states. “They cannot ban weapons of war, they cannot require firearm owners let law enforcement know when their guns go missing, and they cannot require adults in homes with children to store their firearms safely. All because of a successful firearm industry effort 50 years ago to block communities from regulating firearms.”
“Pennsylvania’s municipalities have differing needs when it comes to firearm safety, and locally accountable leaders should be able to address those needs through local regulations,” Frankel continued. “My bill would simply allow our communities to make their own rules regarding deadly firearms, just as they do for fire prevention or traffic regulation.”
Frankel’s memo omitted the fact the legislation would repeal the state’s version of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, Act 59, which it enacted in 1999.
Giffords, a gun control organization, admits that 45 states have preemption laws of varying degrees of strength on the books. Some states, like Colorado and California, allow for local bans on firearms or other restrictions, but in many cases, the preemption laws keep the power to regulate firearms with the state legislatures.
The Department of Justice recently sued the city of Denver over its ban on modern semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15. Colorado has not passed a similar ban into law statewide.
“It… creates confusion when laws vary widely within a state, potentially placing otherwise law-abiding citizens at risk of violating an ordinance of which they were not previously aware, as they travel within their states,” the National Rifle Association’s Institute for Legislative Action (NRA-ILA) says on its website.
“This is just sort of a feeble attempt to strike back,” NRA-ILA Pennsylvania lobbyist Darin Goens told the DCNF, noting that the Pennsylvania state Senate passed SB 822, legislation Goens said “puts teeth” into the state’s current preemption statute.
“Senate Bill 822 finally puts teeth into the law because to us this is settled law. The state has a preemption statute,” Goens explained. “The courts have held it up, you know, end of story. However, these local municipalities have openly flouted the law.”
SB 822, introduced by Republican State Sen. Wayne Langerholc, passed the state Senate by a 30-20 vote on May 6.
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