It Cost One Man This Insane Amount To Legally Carry Gun Across US

In videos posted to social media, a Maryland firearms instructor revealed it cost thousands of dollars to obtain enough concealed carry permits to legally carry a firearm all across the country.

Liberty Justice Center filed a petition for a writ of certiorari with the Supreme Court on Aug. 24, arguing Minnesota’s refusal to recognize out-of-state concealed carry permits was turning the Second Amendment into a “second-class right.” In the videos, one from January 2023, the other from March, Chad Albrecht, the owner of School of the American Rifle based out of Elkton, Maryland, revealed he spent over $12,000 to secure permits from 46 states and the Washington, D.C.

“We’re including the cost of travel to go to the places that are required by law to acquire some of these permits to get to the training to apply in person if it’s required,” Albrecht said in the March video. “So, these things can be very nuanced depending on where you live as well. So, if you live in California and you want to get this permit here from New York City, you have to go all the way to New York City to One Police Plaza to do your fingerprints, to do your photograph, and do the application process for the interview. If you don’t do that, you don’t get a permit.

Reciprocity for actual permits varies widely: some states honor many or most out-of-state licenses (often with conditions such as age 21+, residency of the issuing state, or enhanced permit classes), while roughly 11 jurisdictions—including California, New York, New Jersey, Illinois, Maryland, Massachusetts, Hawaii, Oregon, Rhode Island, and D.C.—honoring few or no permits from out-of-state, according to the United States Concealed Carry Association. Albrecht explained why he spent so much money to acquire the permits.

“We have a lot to lose. I have a federal firearms license, I have a business that’s based around guns, and if I get locked up for carrying in a place that I’m not allowed to carry, my life will be ruined,” Albrecht said in the March video. “So to try to avoid that, I view this as insurance. And I also wanted to do it so that hopefully, the Supreme Court will take recognition of this and see that the excessive burden is not constitutional.”

In June, the Supreme Court narrowed the applicability of a federal law prohibiting marijuana users roughly a week before it issued its ruling in Wolford v. Lopez, a ruling that struck down Hawaii’s “vampire rule” targeting concealed carry. The high court also agreed to hear Viramontes v. Cook County, taking up a Second Amendment challenge to a ban on modern semiautomatic firearms passed by the Illinois locality that includes the city of Chicago.