Seven pro-Second Amendment organizations filed a legal brief urging Maryland's Supreme Court to hear the case of a D.C. resident arrested for carrying a firearm in the state despite holding a valid concealed carry permit.
The coalition, led by the Second Amendment Foundation, the National Rifle Association, and five other groups, filed its amicus brief on July 23, pressing the court to take up Darius Duvall v. State of Maryland. Duvall, a District of Columbia resident, was stopped in a traffic stop in Maryland, searched, and arrested even though he carried a concealed carry permit lawfully issued by D.C. His case now sits before the state's highest court on a petition asking it to review a lower court ruling that went against him, the Daily Caller News Foundation reported.
Maryland refuses to recognize any out-of-state concealed carry permit. The state does not make reciprocity agreements with other states, according to the Maryland State Police. That blanket policy means a law-abiding gun owner who crosses the state line with a permit honored in dozens of other jurisdictions can face criminal charges for exercising a right that was legal minutes earlier.
The amicus brief argues that Maryland's stance contradicts a long historical tradition of accommodating armed travelers, and that recent U.S. Supreme Court rulings have changed the legal landscape enough to warrant a fresh look.
The facts of Duvall's case are straightforward. He lived in Washington, D.C. He obtained a concealed carry permit from D.C. authorities. He traveled through Maryland. Police stopped him, searched him, and arrested him when they found his firearm.
Maryland's gun laws rank among the most restrictive in the country. The state not only requires its own permit process but categorically refuses to honor permits issued anywhere else. A resident of Virginia, Pennsylvania, or any other state who lawfully carries a concealed firearm at home becomes a criminal the moment they cross into Maryland, regardless of their background check, training, or clean record.
The groups filing the brief framed the policy in blunt terms. "Interstate visitors are Americans, yet states like Maryland treat them as suspect foreigners that need to be re-vetted before exercising a fundamental right," the brief states. "As this brief will concisely show, our historical tradition demands exactly the opposite."
The legal argument rests on what the filers call the "traveler's exception", a longstanding practice, documented across dozens of states, of granting travelers greater leeway to carry concealed firearms. The brief points to litigation filed in Hawaii that cataloged dozens of state laws reflecting that tradition.
"Travelers from other states were usually allowed to carry their firearms concealed," the brief states. It calls the historical record on this point "not some outlier, but overwhelming to the point that it justifies this Court summarily reversing the decision below."
That language, "summarily reversing", signals the groups believe the case is so clear-cut that the Maryland Supreme Court should not even need full briefing and oral argument to rule in Duvall's favor. They want the lower court decision overturned outright.
The brief also notes that Duvall was arrested while traveling in a vehicle, making the historical traveler's exception directly applicable. A person driving through a state with a valid permit from his home jurisdiction is precisely the kind of situation the tradition was designed to protect.
The Supreme Court has recently delivered major Second Amendment victories that the amici believe strengthen their hand. The brief cites two decisions, Wolford v. Lopez and Hemani v. United States, as new precedent that should push the Maryland court to reconsider.
This is not the first time these organizations have tried to force the issue. Several of the same groups previously filed a brief at the U.S. Supreme Court asking it to take up the question of out-of-state permit recognition. Neither the Maryland Supreme Court nor the U.S. Supreme Court agreed to hear the matter at that time.
But the groups argue the legal ground has shifted. "Several of the Amici joined a lengthier brief in the United States Supreme Court in support of certiorari on this very issue," the new filing states. "While neither this Court nor the Supreme Court granted review in that matter, the recent decisions in Wolford and Hemani counsel certiorari in this case."
The Hemani decision came in June 2026, and Wolford followed shortly after. The specific holdings of those cases are not detailed in the brief excerpts, but the amici treat them as game-changing enough to justify another run at the Maryland court.
In a separate landmark ruling, the Supreme Court also unanimously struck down a federal gun ban for marijuana users, signaling the current court's willingness to scrutinize firearms restrictions that lack firm historical grounding.
Konstadinos Moros, the SAF's Director of Legal Research and Education, told the Daily Caller News Foundation that the coalition has no plans to stop pushing. "We're going to keep up the pressure," Moros said.
He was candid about the odds:
"It's not that we're confident that any petition will necessarily be granted, but we're just going to keep banging on that door in hopes that they do."
That persistence reflects a broader strategy among Second Amendment litigators. After years of federal courts ignoring or slow-walking gun rights claims, the current Supreme Court has shown a willingness to engage, and lower courts are starting to feel the pressure. Even a Ninth Circuit judge recently called on the Supreme Court to reverse his own court's Second Amendment rulings.
Democratic Attorney General Anthony Brown's office declined to comment when the Daily Caller News Foundation reached out. That silence leaves the state's legal reasoning undefended in the public square, even as seven organizations and their combined legal resources press the court to act.
Brown, a Democrat, oversees the office responsible for defending Maryland's firearms laws in court. His office's refusal to engage publicly does not necessarily signal weakness, attorneys general routinely decline comment on pending litigation. But it does mean taxpayers and gun owners alike have no public explanation for why the state believes its blanket refusal to honor any out-of-state permit can survive the Supreme Court's recent Second Amendment rulings.
The coalition filing the brief spans the country. SAF and CCRKBA are based in the Pacific Northwest. The NRA operates nationally. The California Rifle & Pistol Association and the Minnesota Gun Owners Caucus represent states with their own complex firearms laws. Maryland Shall Issue focuses specifically on the state at the center of this fight. The Second Amendment Law Center rounds out the group. Together, seven organizations signed on, a show of coordinated legal force aimed squarely at one state's outlier policy.
The SAF announced the filing on its social media account on July 23, stating that the brief "challenges the state's refusal to recognize valid, out-of-state carry permits" and "urges the Court to grant review."
The Duvall case exposes a broader problem for lawful gun owners who travel. The United States has no uniform standard for concealed carry reciprocity. Some states honor permits from all other states. Some honor permits from a select list. Maryland honors none.
That means a person who has submitted to a background check, completed required training, paid fees, and received government approval to carry a concealed firearm can become a felon simply by driving across a state line. Duvall did everything his home jurisdiction asked of him. D.C., not exactly a gun-friendly city, approved his permit. Maryland treated that approval as worthless.
The amicus brief frames this as a constitutional problem, not just a policy disagreement. The Second Amendment, as interpreted by the current Supreme Court, protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. If that right is fundamental, the groups argue, a state cannot demand that every American passing through re-apply for permission to exercise it.
The Supreme Court has shown increasing interest in cases that test the boundaries of state firearms regulation. Beyond the gun rights cases, the court has also taken up other questions of government overreach, including an Alaska case where the state seized a pilot's $95,000 plane over a minor offense, a sign that the justices are willing to examine whether government penalties have grown disproportionate to the conduct they punish.
Whether the Maryland Supreme Court agrees to hear Duvall's case remains an open question. The court has not announced a schedule or deadline for responding to the petition. If it declines, the groups will likely return to the U.S. Supreme Court, armed with the same recent precedents and the same argument that Maryland's policy cannot survive honest historical scrutiny.
Darius Duvall followed the law. He got his permit. He carried his firearm legally in the jurisdiction that issued it. Maryland arrested him for it. If that does not merit the court's attention, it is hard to imagine what would.