Gun rights groups have sued Jacksonville over "gun-free zones" that Florida law never authorized, at city-owned venues from EverBank Stadium to the Moran Theater. Most of the coverage stopped at the venue list. The first page of the complaint goes further: Mayor Donna Deegan is sued in her individual capacity, and Florida law says any fine for a knowing and willful violation comes out of her own pocket, not the taxpayers'.

Four Venues, One State Law Jacksonville Allegedly Ignored

Florida Carry, Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners Foundation and two individual gun owners, Luis Valdes and Foster H. Coker III, filed the suit in Duval County Circuit Court. The case number is 16-2026-CA-006676-AXXX-MA. GOA announced it on September 29, but the court stamp on the complaint shows it was e-filed September 23 and accepted by the clerk the next morning.

The defendants are the City of Jacksonville, Sheriff T.K. Waters and Mayor Deegan. According to GOA, the complaint describes incidents at the Moran Theater, the Florida Theatre, the Jacksonville Fairgrounds and EverBank Stadium, where licensed concealed carriers "were forced to disarm or denied entry." Bearing Arms, citing News4JAX, reports that the stadium incident happened at a non-athletic event, and that uniformed officers were involved in several of the encounters.

The legal theory is simple. Since 1987, Florida has reserved the entire field of firearms regulation to the Legislature. Cities and counties cannot write their own gun rules, and that includes rules nobody bothered to write down. The complaint says so directly, challenging "written or unwritten local administrative rules or regulations implemented as venue-admission rules, directives, orders, policies, security instructions, post orders, or recurring enforcement practices."

What Happened at the Moran Theater?

The one incident GOA published in full took place on November 6, 2025. Valdes, GOA's Florida state director, was at the Moran Theater inside the city-owned Jacksonville Center for the Performing Arts to staff a GOA booth at a Megyn Kelly Live event. He held a valid Florida concealed weapon license and was carrying, the complaint says.

While he was setting up, a uniformed Jacksonville Sheriff's Office officer ordered him to take the gun off the property. Valdes asked whether the building was city-owned. The officer said it was. Valdes cited Florida Statutes 790.33 and 790.06, the preemption law and the concealed-carry law. According to paragraph 83, the officer "nevertheless told Luis Valdes that he had two choices: remove the firearm from the property or be trespassed."

He complied, because a trespass would have shut down the booth. One detail stands out. The complaint alleges, on information and belief, that "the private event would have allowed Luis Valdes to carry his firearm, but for Defendants' restrictions." In other words, the event's own organizer was not the one asking. The city was.

The Detail in the Caption: Deegan Is Sued as an Individual

Look at how each defendant is named. Sheriff Waters is sued "in his official capacity" and "in his individual capacity." Mayor Deegan, a Democrat, is sued "in her individual capacity." The title of the filing is "Complaint for Declaratory and Injunctive Relief and Statutory Civil Fines Under Section 790.33." That last phrase matters.

Florida's preemption statute has teeth that most states' versions lack. Under section 790.33(3)(c), if a court finds a violation was knowing and willful, it "shall assess a civil fine of up to $5,000 against the elected or appointed local government official or officials or administrative agency head under whose jurisdiction the violation occurred." Section (3)(d) then bars the use of public funds "to defend or reimburse the unlawful conduct of any person found to have knowingly and willfully violated this section."

Put plainly: if the plaintiffs prove the venue bans were knowing and willful, the fine lands on the official personally, and the city cannot cover it. The complaint's first paragraph says it seeks "the statutory civil fines authorized for knowing and willful violations." No coverage we found mentioned that the mayor's personal exposure is part of this case.

Florida's Supreme Court Already Said These Fines Are Legal

Cities have tried to kill these penalties before. A coalition of local governments, led by the City of Weston, sued to strike them down. The case reached the Florida Supreme Court as Fried v. State, with 30 municipalities, three counties and more than 70 elected officials on the challengers' side, according to the opinion. The lead petitioner was Nikki Fried, then the state's Agriculture Commissioner and a Democrat.

They lost. On January 19, 2023, the court ruled 5-1 that "neither legislative immunity nor governmental function immunity prohibit the statutory actions and penalties in section 790.33(3)(c), (d), and (f)." Justice Ricky Polston wrote for the majority, joined by Chief Justice Carlos Muñiz and Justices Charles Canady, John Couriel and Jamie Grosshans. Justice Jorge Labarga dissented. That means the personal-fine provision Jacksonville's mayor now faces has already survived the state's highest court.

The same statute, in section (3)(f), lets "a person or an organization whose membership is adversely affected" by a policy "whether written or unwritten" sue for declaratory and injunctive relief, plus attorney fees and actual damages capped at $100,000. That is why groups like Florida Carry and GOA can bring this case on behalf of their members. The complaint excerpt we reviewed does not say whether damages are being sought.

Is Jacksonville a Repeat Offender?

This is not the city's first fight over gun owners' rights this year. On May 12, Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued Jacksonville for $5 million over a gun-owner registry. From July 2023 to April 2025, security staff at City Hall and the Yates Building logged the names, ages, ID numbers and firearm types of people who walked in carrying, USA Carry reported. Florida law, section 790.335, flatly bans government lists of gun owners.

The state's complaint in that case points to a 2007 memo from the city's own lawyers warning that no such registry could be kept. Deegan's office has said she and her leadership team did not know about the logbooks. She also called the state's case "silly season" politics, per USA Carry.

Cam Edwards of Bearing Arms put it this way: with the registry case pending, "you'd think" city officials "would be extra cautious about staying on the right side of the state's gun laws." Florida Carry's Sean Caranna has told the outlet that the group sends warning letters to local governments that break the preemption law, and many fix the problem without a lawsuit. This time the groups went to court.

What Can the City Argue?

Florida does bar licensed carry in a list of places under section 790.06(12)(a). As Bearing Arms notes, that list includes any professional athletic event "not related to firearms." That list may be why the stadium claim focuses on a non-athletic event. A Jaguars game is off-limits by state law. A concert or other event at the same city-owned stadium is a different question.

Edwards argues the city's best defense would be that it acts as a property owner, not a regulator. The preemption statute, though, has no carve-out for city-owned entertainment venues. Neither the city nor the Sheriff's Office had filed a formal response as of October 1, according to The Tampa Free Press.

Why Gun Owners Everywhere Should Watch This

Plenty of states have preemption laws. Very few give them consequences that reach a mayor personally. Florida's Legislature wrote that rule because local officials kept ignoring the law, and the state Supreme Court upheld it over the objections of dozens of cities.

"Jacksonville does not get to invent its own gun laws," Valdes said in GOA's statement. If a Duval County judge agrees, and finds the bans were knowing and willful, this case could become the first real test of whether an official pays out of pocket for disarming law-abiding Floridians. That would get the attention of every city hall in the state.

Top photo: Jacksonville Mayor Donna Deegan speaks at a ceremony at the 125th Fighter Wing. (Photo: Chelsea Smith, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons)