NRA Sues L.A. for Requiring Contractors to Disclose Support for Group

The National Rifle Association filed suit against Los Angeles on Wednesday after the city passed an ordinance requiring contractors disclose their support for the gun-rights group in order to work with the city.

The NRA, alongside an unnamed business that supports the organization and holds work contracts with Los Angeles, filed the suit in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California. They claim the city's ordinance is unconstitutional and violates the First Amendment's free speech and free association protections as well as the Fourteenth Amendment's equal protection clause.

"The Ordinance, on its face and as applied or threatened to be applied, imposes an unconstitutional ideological litmus test for independent contractors, requiring that they disclose information about their political beliefs and associations," Anna M. Barvir, counsel for the NRA, wrote in a complaint filed by the group. "The Ordinance, on its face and as applied or threatened to be applied, is unconstitutional because it seeks disclosure of Plaintiffs' political beliefs and associations solely for the purpose of withholding government contracts."