Wolford v. Lopez: the Court strikes Hawaii’s no-carry-by-default rule

What the Court decided

On June 25, 2026, the Supreme Court ruled 6–3 in Wolford v. Lopez that Hawaii violated the Second Amendment by barring concealed-carry license holders from bringing handguns onto private property open to the public, such as shops, gas stations and restaurants, unless the owner had given express permission.

Justice Samuel Alito wrote for the majority, joined by Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh and Amy Coney Barrett. Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson dissented, joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, and Justice Elena Kagan wrote a separate dissent.

Why the law mattered

Hawaii adopted the rule after the Court’s 2022 Bruen decision required states to issue carry licenses to qualified applicants. Critics called it a “vampire rule” because a licensed person could not enter most places unless invited in. Violations were misdemeanors punishable by up to a year in jail.

Hawaii was one of five states with a default rule of this kind. Courts had already blocked similar provisions in New York, California and Maryland. Three Maui County residents and the Hawaii Firearms Coalition sued in 2023; a district court sided with them, but the Ninth Circuit upheld the law before the Supreme Court reversed.

What the ruling leaves in place

The decision does not require property owners to allow guns. Owners can still post signs or tell visitors firearms are not welcome. The defect, the majority said, was the state presuming a ban everywhere on the owner’s behalf.

The ruling also did not address Hawaii’s separate restrictions in places such as bars, beaches and parks, or longstanding limits in sensitive places like schools and government buildings. Those remain in effect unless challenged separately.

The dissents

Justice Jackson argued the case was really about property rights, since no one has a constitutional right to enter another person’s property without permission, and warned that the majority was turning Bruen into a rule that favors gun access over legislative judgment. Justice Kagan pointed to colonial and founding-era laws that barred carrying onto others’ land without consent.

Afterlight analysis

Commentators across the spectrum read Wolford as a refinement of Bruen rather than a new test: the burden stays on governments to show a historical tradition, and a rule that makes lawful carry presumptively illegal almost everywhere will not pass. Expect challenges to lists of “sensitive places” to be the next front, since that question was left open.