Federal Judge Upholds Connecticut’s Under-21 Handgun Ban, Rejecting SAF and CCDL Challenge on Every Major Issue

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HARTFORD, CT — A federal judge has upheld Connecticut’s laws barring adults under 21 from obtaining pistol permits or possessing handguns, handing a loss to the Second Amendment Foundation, the Connecticut Citizens Defense League, and two Connecticut residents who challenged the restrictions.

In Succow v. Bondi, U.S. District Judge Sarala Nagala ruled that Connecticut’s age-based handgun restrictions do not violate the Second Amendment. Attorney General William Tong announced the decision in a July 27, 2026 press release, calling it “a major victory for commonsense gun safety and for Connecticut families.”

The lawsuit was brought by CCDL, SAF, and residents Zachary Succow and Samuel Towne, who argued that Connecticut’s prohibition on adults under 21 obtaining pistol permits or possessing handguns violates their constitutional rights. The case went through a two-day bench trial, and Judge Nagala ruled for the state on every major issue. She found that Succow lacked standing to bring the challenge, and she held that Connecticut’s laws are consistent with the nation’s history of regulating the ability of under-21-year-olds to obtain and carry handguns.

The ruling did not stop at state law. Judge Nagala also upheld the constitutionality of the federal laws restricting the sale of handguns to buyers under 21.

That last part matters. Those are the same federal restrictions at the center of the fight SAF has been waging in the Fifth Circuit. Last year, a three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit held that the federal ban on firearm purchases by adults under 21 is unconstitutional, and the Department of Justice declined to ask the Supreme Court to review that decision. SAF, the Firearms Policy Coalition, and the Louisiana Shooting Association are still litigating the scope of that win in FPC v. ATF, formerly Reese v. ATF, after the district court limited the injunction to organization members inside the Fifth Circuit’s three states. SAF filed its opening brief on that question in June.

“There is no doubt adults in this age range are part of ‘the People,’ and it’s high time the government stopped fighting the inevitable,” SAF founder Alan Gottlieb said in that June release on the federal case.

What stands out to me is how cleanly the courts have split. Inside the Fifth Circuit, the federal purchase ban has been declared unconstitutional. In Connecticut, a district judge has now blessed both the state restrictions and the federal ones. A sister case SAF is supporting, West Virginia Citizens Defense League v. ATF, challenges the same federal law and is pending a petition for certiorari before the Supreme Court. When lower courts give opposite answers to the same constitutional question, that is exactly the kind of conflict the Supreme Court exists to resolve.

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Tong made clear the state sees this as a template. “We will continue to fight the reckless attempts to weaken Connecticut’s gun safety protections,” he said in the release.

As of this writing, I have not seen a public response from SAF or CCDL to the Succow ruling. Given that SAF has, in Gottlieb’s words, been fighting the under-21 purchase ban for “more than half a decade,” I would not expect this to be the end of the road. I will continue tracking Succow v. Bondi, the Fifth Circuit scope appeal, and the pending Supreme Court petition as they develop.