Dupage Policy Journal

John Krupa III, the CEO of Spartan Tactical Training Group, is encouraging Illinois gun owners to get involved in the legal fight against the state’s sweeping gun ban.

Krupa shared a link to a form for individuals who are interested to make a contribution to help support the fight. 

“Eric Callis and the folks at the Aurora Sportsman's Club have been doing a fantastic job ramping up to file lawsuits to challenge the new Illinois Assault Weapon Ban law,” Krupa said on a Facebook public group, Illinois Gun Owners Together. “Their Legal Defense Fund is going to need donations to help pay for the extraordinary legal expenses that are involved in making this fight happen! I encourage everyone that is serious about protecting their 2A rights to contribute to this fund and give them what they need to help win our rights back. We can’t do this alone. We need every firearm owner in Illinois ALL IN on this one! Stay safe.” 

The Protect Illinois Communities Act HB 5471 classifies all semi-automatic weapons as assault weapons. The law requires certain firearms to be registered. As many as five million firearms and ten million magazines in the state may be affected. Gun rights advocates have begun litigation against the state claiming it is unconstitutional under the Second Amendment, Chicago City Wire reported.

In Effingham County, the gun ban was stopped after Judge Joshua Morrison issued a temporary restraining order (TRO) last week. That TRO means the law will not be applied to the 866 plaintiffs represented by attorney Thomas DeVore until it can be heard in court. “We will see if the state wants to appeal. If not, we’ll work on getting this pursued to a final ruling so we can get to the merits of these issues, sooner rather than later,” DeVore, recently the Republican candidate for attorney general, told The Center Square. The plaintiffs included 862 Illinois citizens from more than 80 counties and four licensed firearms dealers.

The Center Square has reported another 1,690 plaintiffs joined a second lawsuit headed by DeVore after the Effingham County ruling. “How many plaintiffs in the second case? … I don’t want to give that away,” DeVore said. “I’m going to let the governor hang in suspense and he’ll find out … when we file this thing. I’m really pleased with the support because we’re going and we’re going to go off into federal court and we’re going to get the governor's attention in a bigger way than we’ve already got.” Of the nearly 1,700 plaintiffs across 92 counties in the second case, 62 are gun stores.

The Illinois State Rifle Association, the Firearms Policy Coalition, Inc., and the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), along with several gun owners from across Illinois have filed joint action in federal court against the State of Illinois over the gun ban. "The Second Amendment Foundation has filed a motion for preliminary injunction in its federal court challenge of the recently-signed ban on modern semiautomatic rifles and their ammunition magazines. The case is known as Harrel v. Raoul," SAF said in a news release. "Joining SAF are the Illinois State Rifle Association, Firearms Policy Coalition, C4 Gun Store LLC, Marengo Guns, Inc. and a private citizen, Dane Harrel, for whom the case is named. They are represented by attorney David Sigale of Wheaton, Ill. The motion was filed in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois."

Altogether 85 of Illinois’ 102 counties have said they will not enforce the ban due to what they see as constitutional violations, according to Colion Noir.