Barred from Fort Lauderdale’s War Memorial Auditorium, Florida Gun Shows Inc.’s two-day events found their way last year to Pembroke Pines’ Charles F. Dodge City Center.
But after three shows, that city now wants the gun show to go somewhere else.
The gun shows’ owner and operator Khaled Akkawi, however, doesn’t want to move the show anywhere else, and he doesn’t believe the city has the legal right to force it out.
Still, “we’re going to talk to them,” Akkawi said Saturday. “We’ll see if we can work things out. I don’t know. I haven’t sat down with my lawyers yet.”
On Jan. 13, City Manager Charles F. Dodge notified Akkawi by letter that the city would not be licensing any more gun show events at the city center after the Jan. 18-19 show.
The letter said the city is a plaintiff in a lawsuit challenging the state’s right to penalize local officials — by removal from office and a $5,000 fine — who try to adopt any gun control laws that supersede state laws broadly allowing gun purchases, possession and ownership.
After the February 2018 mass shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, numerous cities, counties and local officials challenged the law, saying it made them afraid to implement background checks and waiting periods that do not interfere with state-protected gun rights.
In June, a circuit judge struck down the fine and removal components of the law as unconstitutional, while leaving intact the state’s overriding authority on gun control laws.
Gov. Ron DeSantis and Attorney General Ashley Moody are appealing the court ruling, while Pembroke Pines and the local governments that challenged the law are urging the appellate court to let it stand.
In his Jan. 13 letter to Akkawi disinviting future gun shows, Dodge said that “the city does not intend to reconsider its position on this matter until after the conclusion of this litigation, if at all.”
Akkawi, who stages 40 gun shows a year across Florida, said Saturday that if he sues Pembroke Pines, he would claim the city’s position would violate the state’s law prohibiting local governments from superseding state gun rights.
He used a similar argument when he sued Fort Lauderdale over its refusal to allow gun shows at War Memorial Auditorium after three decades.
Fort Lauderdale then decided to lease the facility full time to the Florida Panthers to build public ice skating and hockey rinks and indoor sports fields. That rendered Akkawi’s challenge moot, and both sides agreed to drop the case.
After news surfaced that the gun show was coming to the Charles F. Dodge City Center last Aug. 10-11, city officials said they had not approved the event and did not know about it. Scheduling of events at the facility was outsourced to a private events management company.
Before Dodge’s letter arrived, Akkawi said he was trying to get signatures on contracts for additional dates in Pembroke Pines for 2020, 2021 and 2022.
“I kept asking for the contract and they kept postponing,” he said.
With the city’s intent now clear, Akkawi said he expects the matter to end up in court. “What choice do I have?” he said.
He said he has no desire to leave the facility, which is less than three years old. “I’m going to do everything I can to stay here. I love the building.”
As for this weekend’s show, he said attendance ran about 20 to 30 percent below normal on Saturday, but he thinks a lot of his crowd instead went to the 35th Annual Chili CookOff, organized by KISS Country 99.90 and “powered” by Ford.
“Chili and country western music — we have the same demographic,” he said.
