Mark Baird v. Rob Bonta
Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit · No. 23-15016 · 81 F.4th 1036
⚖️Procedural — no merits ruling
reversal turned on the district court's use of the wrong preliminary injunction standard; the merits were left for remand
GunMapUSA assessment of the outcome's direction, not a statement that the court decided rightly or wrongly.
What the court held
Two Californians who cannot obtain open-carry licenses sought to enjoin the penal code provisions criminalizing unlicensed open carry of a handgun. The Ninth Circuit held the district court abused its discretion by denying a preliminary injunction without ever assessing likelihood of success on the merits, resting instead on the public interest and balance of harms. It reversed and remanded with instructions to conduct the full Winter analysis expeditiously under Bruen's framework, without deciding whether the open-carry ban is constitutional.
Summarized from the court's opinion.
What this case is about
California restrictions on the open carry of handguns in public
GunMapUSA summary of the issue, not a quotation from the court.
Key Dates
- 2023-09-07 — Decided
- 2023-06-29 — Argued
Sources
- CourtListener — retrieved 2026-08-08
Summary of public court records. Not legal advice.