A south Mississippi lawmaker who proposed legislation aimed at getting firearms out of the hands of domestic violence abusers chose not to bring the bill up for a vote in the Senate in the face of opposition from the National Rifle Association.
The bill is dead this session, but Sen. Brice Wiggins, a Republican from Pascagoula, has vowed to try again next year.
On the Senate floor, he moved on Feb. 12 without a single senator asking why to have his bill recommitted to the Judiciary B Committee, noting he was aware members of the chamber had received an alert from the NRA about the legislation. The NRA-ILA, the organization’s lobbying arm, also posted about his bill earlier that week, encouraging people to contact their Mississippi senator to oppose it.
Wiggins said he has been an NRA member and that he votes for every Second Amendment bill that comes through the state Legislature. But he said the gun lobby’s action and opposition of the legislation shows how there’s been a loss of common sense.
Senate Bill 2339 would have criminalized firearm and ammunition possession for people who are the subject of a domestic violence protection order, bringing state law in line with federal law. The bill also would have removed guns and ammunition from people convicted of domestic violence misdemeanors.
“This bill is for and supported by domestic violence survivors, advocates and people who understand that domestic violence is an epidemic in the state of Mississippi,” Wiggins said on the Senate floor in February.
To punctuate that point, he said the state has the highest overall gun death in the country.
The same morning the bill died, Pearl police responded to a call at a home where a man assaulted a woman, leading to an hours-long standoff. After using a breaching tool to get inside and arrest the man, SWAT team members found 10 firearms.
Wiggins also cited statistics gathered by Mississippi Today showing that at least 300 Mississippians, including victims, abusers, law enforcement and children – died from domestic violence incidents between 2020 and 2024. Most of them involved firearms.
He said the bill was based on a 2024 decision in USA v. Rahimi. In an 8-to-1 ruling, the U.S. Supreme Court found there is a longstanding tradition of temporarily disarming those who pose a credible threat to others, as long as there is due process. The high court also ruled doing so did not violate the Second Amendment.
