It’s been several months since President Donald Trump surged federal law enforcement resources in Washington, D.C. with an eye towards curbing violent crime, and as Second Amendment Foundation’s Kostas Moros pointed out over the weekend, the strategy seems to be paying off.
It’s been two months since the DC policing surge by the Trump Admin.
The City has had just 13 homicides since then. It’s average two-month rate, based on last year, is about 31 homicides. (And that’s assuming an even sprewd throughout the year; but warmer months are worse).…
— Kostas Moros (@MorosKostas) October 12, 2025
That’s pretty remarkable, and despite predictions by gun control activists that Trump’s 2A policies would make D.C. and other cities more dangerous, the drop in crime coincides with the decision by the DOJ to not prosecute violations of the District’s ban on “large capacity” magazines and carrying rifles (subject to the District’s gun registration laws).
While D.C. is a safer place than it was just a few months ago, violent crimes are still taking place, and it’s still inordinately difficult for non-residents to exercise their right to carry in self-defense. Donald Trump’s Second Amendment Task Force has boasted about reducing processing times for D.C. carry permits to just a matter of days, but anyone applying still must take and pass a D.C.-specific carry course; one that’s not fully offered in the District thanks to a lack of publicly accessible ranges, and hardly available at all outside of the D.C. suburbs in Virginia and Maryland.
NRA-ILA Executive Director John Commerford says it’s time for Congress to step up and pass a national concealed carry reciprocity law, which would (among other things), allow lawful gun owners from across the country to exercise their right to bear arms when visiting the District.
Currently, standards for permit reciprocity vary from state to state. A handful of anti-gun states refuse to recognize the permits of any other states, simply to suppress the exercise of the right to bear arms within their borders. This creates challenges, for example, for the thousands of licensed concealed carriers who commute within the D.C. metro area, which includes Maryland and Virginia. Virginia accepts the licenses of other jurisdictions, but the District and Maryland do not. A wrong turn that takes a motorist over a state boundary could suddenly mean an unintentional violation of the law, with potentially ruinous consequences.
The numerous disparities between state laws have created traps for lawful carriers, leading to an abundance of confusion and, in some cases, criminal charges for those simply exercising their Second Amendment rights. Because of this, well-trained and law-abiding gun owners are less likely to protect themselves or those around them, for fear of being arrested and prosecuted — resulting in fewer “good guys with guns” and more unarmed victims for “bad guys with guns.”
The Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act would protect your right to self-defense and allow for national concealed carry reciprocity, protecting law-abiding citizens no matter where they are. Our organization has been at the forefront of this fight for many years; we believe that the Second Amendment is not bound by state lines and red tape. This bill, which has been before Congress time and again with bipartisan support, now sits in bureaucratic limbo.
Of course, at the moment Congress isn’t passing much of anything at all, with the House sitting in a pro forma session while the federal government shutdown continues. But even before the spending impasse, the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act wasn’t getting much attention in the House, where it stands a much better chance of passage than in the Senate.
The right to keep and bear arms isn’t just the only right on which governments can impose licensing demands. It’s the only right that essentially stops at the border of the state where you live. The Supreme Court has said the Second Amendment isn’t a second-class right, but the lack of national concealed carry reciprocity relegates fhe right to bear arms to nothing more than a privilege in places like the District of Columbia, where no out-of-state permits are recognized whatsoever.
Sure, non-residents can apply for a license, but that’s impractical for many visitors, and downright impossible if you live in a place where the training regime mandated by D.C. officials isn’t available. Commerford is right that Congress needs to act. Even if the prospects of passage in the Senate are slim at the moment, a successful vote in the House would at least put some pressure on members of the upper chamber, and possibly even result in a reciprocity bill getting to Donald Trump’s desk in the Oval Office.
Editor’s Note: The Schumer Shutdown is here. Rather than put the American people first, Chuck Schumer and the radical Democrats forced a government shutdown for healthcare for illegals. They own this.
Help us continue to report the truth about the Schumer Shutdown. Use promo code POTUS47 to get 74% off your VIP membership.
Read the full article here
