Illinois State Police Director Brendan Kelly removed to federal court a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the state’s Firearms Owners Identification (FOID) card statute.
The case was filed by Wood River attorney Thomas Maag in the Madison County Circuit Court. Maag urged the court not to transfer the case in accordance with a new Illinois law which now requires such cases to be litigated in either Chicago or Springfield.
Kelly filed a notice of removal to the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois on July 24. The motion was filed through Assistant Attorney General Joshua Ratz, who argues that the complaint is removable because it alleges Kelly violated plaintiff Gary E. Myers’ Second and Fourteenth Amendment rights.
“This action is removable … because it arises under the Constitution, laws or treaties of the United States and therefore the court has original jurisdiction over it,” the notice states.
The FOID card dispute argues that Myers seeks to possess “literally any legal and effective firearm” for “personal private self defense in his home.” In order to do so, Illinois law requires Myers to have a valid FOID card.
Maag claims Myers was denied a FOID card on May 12 in violation of his Second and Fourteenth Amendment rights. Myers was denied “on the basis that Illinois law prohibits issuing a FOID card to a person prohibited by any Illinois state statute or federal law from acquiring or possessing firearms and that there is some allegedly relevant disqualification from South Carolina in 2017.”
Maag alleges the “South Carolina matter refers to a non-violent drug conviction.”
Maag argues that the Second Amendment protects the right to possess and acquire a firearm. He adds that because the right to a FOID card is constitutionally “co-extensive” with the right to keep and bear arms, the FOID card statute is unconstitutional.
“The defendant cannot show that the Republic has a longstanding history and tradition of depriving people like plaintiff of their firearms, or any other applicable statute, cannot constitutionally strip him of his Second Amendment rights,” Maag wrote.
Beyond the FOID card challenge, Maag urges the court not to transfer Myers’ complaint to either Cook or Sangamon County in accordance with House Bill 3062, which was signed by Gov. J.B. Pritzker on June 7 and establishes fixed jurisdiction.
Maag argues that Pirtzker and the Illinois state legislature enacted the jurisdictional law after “having been successfully sued on multiple occasions in recent years for violating the constitutional rights of citizens of Illinois, and in violation of their oaths of office.”
Under the law, jurisdiction is bound to Sangamon and Cook Counties “no matter how inconvenient or inaccessible the forum is to the victim of the constitutional violation, and no matter where the effect of the constitutional violation took place,” Maag wrote.
Maag filed Myers’ lawsuit in Madison County Circuit Court “in express and intentional violation of the void and unconstitutional 735 ILCS5/2-101.5.”
Maag argues that Pirtzker and the Illinois state legislature enacted the jurisdictional law after “having been successfully sued on multiple occasions in recent years for violating the constitutional rights of citizens of Illinois, and in violation of their oaths of office.”
Maag claims Illinoisans’ legal rights are worthless under a law that deprives them of the opportunity to use the courts effectively, “which is the intent of the statute, so as to allow the state to violate the Constitution with relative impunity.”
U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Illinois case number 3:23-cv-2553