Governor Abigail Spanberger spent Friday signing some of the many gun bills lawmakers sent to her desk during the 2026 legislative session, and now advocates are celebrating the move.
Thanks to Governor Spanberger’s signature, Virginia will soon have new limits on firearms, a move celebrated by Emma Brown Executive Director at the gun violence prevention group GIFFORDS.
“Governor Spanberger ran on reducing gun crimes; she has delivered on that promise," Brown said in an interview Monday. "Getting these bills over the finish line, creating a safer Virginia for families, law enforcement, for communities across the commonwealth.”
“As a former federal law enforcement officer and someone who comes from a law enforcement family, public safety is personal to me,” Spanberger said in a statement announcing signatures Friday. “We are taking concrete steps to make sure Virginia’s law enforcement has the support they need to keep our communities safe.”
One of the bills Spanberger signed would close the so-called boyfriend loophole in Virginia’s domestic violence law. It allows the court to take the firearm from someone convicted of domestic violence. Currently, the law is limited to spouses and family members, but under the new measure introduced by Fairfax Senator Russet Perry, the law will be expanded to include those in romantic relationships.
“Domestic violence, whenever a firearm is introduced the rate of homicide goes off the charts," Perry told Radio IQ Monday. "This is just filling in the loophole for those folks who are not married but in intimate relationships that we can protect them too, so we don’t lose them to homicide.”
Another effort seeks to hold gun retailers and manufacturers liable if they act irresponsibly; think selling a gun to someone who shouldn’t have it. Similar laws have survived legal challenges in northern states, but Second Amendment advocates like Republican Minority leader Delegate Terry Kilgore said in a statement the new measure violates federal law.
“Taxpayers will be out hundreds of thousands if not millions of dollars in legal fees and the law won’t ever come into effect,” Kilgore said after the bill was signed Friday.
In a social media post over the weekend, Assistant Attorney General at the Department of Justice's Civil Rights Division Chief Harmeet Dhillon said Virginia was "on notice" for gun rights violations.
"We are closely watching—in the event any unlawful legislation is enacted," Dhillon wrote. "We will sue."
Dhillon already has her eyes on Virginia after opening a probe into Fairfax County Public Schools in early 2025 over alleged discriminatory admissions policies.
Similar claims, filed by a group of local parents in 2021, were found to be meritless, and the U.S. Supreme Court allowed that ruling to stay in place in 2024.
Other signed bills include a ban on the production and sale of so-called ghost guns and another that allows those who lose their right to carry a firearm because of a domestic violence dispute to transfer that gun to an eligible person who does not live in their home.
