After Uthmeier Refuses to Defend Parkland Law, House Advances Gun Buying Age Repeal

TALLAHASSEE—Days after Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier announced that he would not defend a contentious law banning under-21-year-olds from buying firearms, a House committee on Thursday advanced a bill overturning the Parkland-era law.

The measure, HB 759, repeals part of the Marjory Stoneman Douglas Act to allow 18 to 20-year-olds to purchase long guns. It was discussed in the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday, a week after a federal appeals court upheld Florida’s under-21 purchasing ban.

A ban that Uthmeier, newly appointed to Florida’s chief legal role, strongly opposes.

“It’s hard to have a policy discussion when there’s so much emotion in the room, and I think that’s what happened years ago when the [Marjory Stoneman Douglas Act] was originally passed,” said bill sponsor Rep. Michelle Salzman, a Republican, in the Judiciary Committee.

“We hear emotional arguments all the time as members of this legislature, and it’s our responsibility to put the emotion aside and to make balance and to bring equity into the state,” she added, arguing that her measure is necessary to guarantee a full breadth of Second Amendment protections.

And though HB 759 passed the Judiciary Committee in a 16 to 6 vote, with new Republican Rep. Hillary Cassel being the sole conservative to vote “no,” two federal appeals courts have disagreed.

Last week, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in an 8-4 decision outlined the history of the nation’s gun laws, noting that “the Florida law is consistent with our regulatory tradition in why and how it burdens the right of minors to keep and bear arms.” 

Upholding a three-judge panel’s ruling from 2023, the court bucked the National Rifle Association, which has challenged the law since its 2018 inception. It followed a different appeals court ruling earlier this year that a federal age restriction on firearms was unconstitutional.

These decisions set up a potential U.S. Supreme Court showdown—one that Uthmeier will refuse to participate in. Hours after the appeals decision was delivered, Uthmeier took to social media to announce that he believed the law unconstitutional and would not defend it in future legal proceedings.

“If the NRA decides to seek further review at SCOTUS, I am directing my office not to defend this law,” he wrote.

What Does the Bill Do and Will it Pass?

HB 759 would allow all 18-year-olds to buy long guns like rifles and shotguns. This would overturn the portion of the 2018 law raising the age to 21, which was passed weeks after 19-year-old Nikolas Cruz entered Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on Valentine’s Day with his legally purchased AR-15 and opened fire. 

He killed 14 students and three staff.

Debbie Hixon, the wife of coach Chris Hixon, who was one of Cruz’s 17 victims, spoke out against the bill on Thursday.

“This feels like salt being poured into an open wound,” Hixon said, arguing that the purchasing age made communities safer. “Now you want to repeal things, and to me, that makes me feel like you have forgotten who my husband and the other 16 victims were.”

Democrat Rep. Dan Daley, an alum of the now-demolished Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, echoed her comments.

“I’ve read the Second Amendment; please point to the part that says you get to be 18 and 20 years old and have an AR-15. Show me the words,” Daley said. “You can’t.”

While current law forbids the purchasing of long guns by most under-21-year-olds, it does not prohibit their possession. This means an 18-year-old can be legally gifted a rifle. It also allows active law enforcement and service members to purchase a long gun.

But Second Amendment activists say this doesn’t go far enough. This is the third time a bill lowering the gun-purchasing age to the pre-Parkland era has been introduced in the House in recent years, but it’s never been heard in the Senate.

And according to Republican Senate President Ben Albritton, it’s unclear if 2025 will be the year.

“This is not easy,” he said during a press avail on Wednesday, maintaining that he still hasn’t decided on supporting or opposing lowering the purchasing age. He told reporters that he and his wife went to the high school after the tragedy, and later met the parents of 15-year-old Luke Hoyer, one of the Parkland victims.

“I do the best that I can to measure based on all my values, on all my experiences,” Albritton continued. “That includes living in rural Florida. It includes being an NRA lifetime member. It includes my concealed carry permit. 

“It includes Luke Hoyer.”

This was HB 759's final committee stop. It will next head to the floor.