The move was announced in a letter from the Justice Department to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.).
The Department of Justice (DOJ) last week said it will dismiss its appeal in a case challenging the federal ban on the concealed carry of a firearm in U.S. Postal Service offices.
In a letter issued to House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) on Aug. 15, the DOJ stated that it dismissed its pending appeal in the case known as United States v. Ayala, which involved a U.S. Postal Service truck driver who had a concealed carry permit and carried a concealed pistol while walking into a post office.
The driver, Emmanuel Ayala, was stopped by two U.S. Postal Service Office of Inspector General agents, who tried to detain him. He fled the scene but was later arrested by the police department of Tampa, Florida, according to court documents.
Ayala was later indicted for possessing a firearm in a federal facility and for forcibly resisting arrest.
In the DOJ letter, Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote that Ayala “carried a handgun on the job for self-defense” and that the DOJ has now dismissed its appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit. The department had filed its appeal after a federal judge in 2024 dismissed the federal gun charge and found that the statute that prohibits people from carrying a concealed firearm with a concealed carry permit in a post office location is in violation of the Second Amendment.
“The Department has determined that, in these circumstances, continuing to pursue the appeal is not an appropriate use of prosecutorial resources,” the letter reads.
It states that the resisting arrest charge filed against Ayala is still pending.
The federal judge’s 2024 order cited the U.S. Supreme Court’s New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen decision in stating that “the government must point to historical principles that would permit” prohibiting guns in post offices.
“The facts and arguments advanced by the United States fail to carry their burden under Bruen, much less preserve potential wrinkles based on competing constitutional principles,” Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle of the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida wrote in the order.
