‘It is shameful,” the White House press secretary said this week, “that so soon after another tragic school shooting, Florida governor Ron DeSantis signed into law a permitless concealed-carry bill behind closed doors, which eliminates the need to get a license to carry a concealed weapon.”

As is typical of this administration, this is demagoguery of the highest order. It is true that, this week, Ron DeSantis signed a bill that “eliminates the need to get a license to carry a concealed weapon” in Florida. But there was nothing shameful, tragic, clandestine, or even unusual about his having done so. Both DeSantis and Florida’s state legislature have been open about their intention to make Florida a permitless-carry state for a while. They were open about it before the legislative session started. They were open about it when the bill was filed in February. They were open about it during the debate and amendment processes. They were open about it when the final version passed the House, 76 to 32. They were open about it when the House’s bill passed the Senate, 27 to 13. They were open about it when Governor DeSantis signed the provision into law.

Having put down his signing pen, DeSantis said simply that “Constitutional Carry is in the books.” As oratory goes, this was unlikely to be anthologized. But, then, it didn’t need to be. Twenty years ago, permitless carry was rare. In 2002, only one state used the system (Vermont), and it had been forced to do so by a court decision in 1903. Now, a majority of American states have made the change. Maine is a permitless-carry state. Arizona is a permitless-carry state. Ohio is a permitless-carry state. So are Utah, New Hampshire, Alaska, Iowa, and Wyoming. Throw a dart at a map of the United States, and you are more likely than not to hit a state that has abolished its permitting process. What sort of rhetorical fireworks, exactly, did President Biden and his team expect to mark the occasion?

And what do “tragic school shootings” have to do with it? The sole effect of Florida’s bill is to remove the requirement that concealed carriers in the state must obtain a permit before exercising their right to bear arms. The law does not alter who may carry firearms in Florida. It does not alter which firearms may be carried in Florida. It does not alter where firearms may be carried in Florida, either. Now, as before, schools remain off-limits under both state and federal law. Now, as before, it is illegal to kill schoolchildren. Now, as before, concealed carriers are a nonfactor in crime. There is no nexus between permitless carry and school shootings, and there never has been a nexus between permitless carry and school shootings. Not once, in the entire history of the United States, has the behavior of a school shooter so much as intersected with the concealed-carry regulations of the state in which he committed his atrocity. The claim is absurd.

In essence, Florida’s bill is a bureaucratic change, born of a desire to shake off the last vestiges of Jim Crow-era Second Amendment restrictions, of a desire to remove useless impediments to the exercise of an enumerated constitutional right, and of a desire to bring Florida into line with its neighbors (when Florida’s bill goes into effect in June, it will be possible to drive from Key West to Idaho without ever leaving a permitless-carry state). In 2003, when Alaska became the first state to pass permitless carry through its legislature, one might have forgiven Americans for wondering if abolishing that particular licensing system was sensible. But now? When 25 states have done the same thing, and nothing has happened as a result? The objections smack of zealotry. As data from Texas and Florida have shown, legally eligible concealed carriers are up to seven times more law-abiding than the police. To believe that this was the product of the permits for which they were forced to apply is as silly as to believe that there exists a cohort of would-be violent criminals whose evil intentions have been thwarted by the presence of laminated cards. The idea does not pass the smell test.

Which is why, bit by bit, state by state, region by region, it has been unceremoniously abandoned. Under current Supreme Court precedent, states are permitted to require carry permits, but they are not permitted to discriminate in any way when issuing them. This being so, a host of state legislatures has come to ask why they were bothering in the first place. This week, Florida was added to their number. Before the year is out, it may be joined by South Carolina, Louisiana, and Nebraska. After that, there will be more. Occasionally, common sense prevails.