A proposal that would lower the minimum age requirement to purchase a long gun in Florida from 21 to 18 won approval in its first committee stop in the Florida House on Tuesday.
The measure (HB 133), sponsored by Rep. Tyler Sirois, R-Merritt Island, is likely to advance through the House in the coming session, as a similar proposal has passed the entire chamber in each of the past three years. However, it’s stalled in the Legislature because there hasn’t been a Senate companion.
The measure passed in the Criminal Justice Subcommittee along party lines, 11-5. It now has just one more committee stop before it would go before the entire chamber for a vote.
The Florida Legislature raised the minimum age to purchase a firearm from 18 to 21 after the mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in 2018.
The National Rifle Association immediately challenged the law in court, but earlier this year, the full U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eleventh Circuit denied that challenge, two years after a three-judge panel similarly ruled against the organization. The NRA has since appealed the case to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier said after that ruling that his office would not defend the law if in fact the NRA filed an appeal with the high court.
Speaking for the legislation, Rep. Jessica Baker, R-Duval County, noted that now in Florida a 19-year-old can own a long gun if someone gives it to him or her, but cannot purchase one. “If we believe in equality, how is it fair that a young adult from a well-off family can get a gun as a gift, and protect their homes and their families, but a young adult with no family support cannot?” she asked.
Rep. Christine Hunschofsky, D-Broward, said that the mother of the teen who killed the 17 people in Parkland in 2018 had said that she never would have given him a gun. “He was able to get his hands on that gun because he was allowed to purchase it. And that’s why the law is written the way it is,” she said.
There is not yet a Senate companion, and it’s not certain that there will be. Rep. Sirois said that the Senate’s deadline to file legislation passes when the 2026 regular legislative session begins.
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