Republican South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson has sued the City of Columbia over a trio of gun-related ordinances Mayor Steve Benjamin and Columbia City Council have passed in the last year.

Wilson filed the lawsuit Wednesday in the state Supreme Court. The attorney general is asking the Supreme Court to hear the matter without it going through the lower court system first.

“We have consistently advised for almost three decades, since 1991, that state law preempts local regulation of firearms," Wilson said, in a release. "These ordinances clearly violate the state law that prohibits local governments from passing any gun laws or ordinances that regulate the transfer, ownership, or possession of firearms.”

Benjamin tells Free Times he received a call from Wilson early Wednesday informing him the lawsuit was coming.

The lawsuit dropped on the same day that the Democratic Benjamin was set to deliver his annual State of the City address.

During that Wednesday night speech, Benjamin referenced Wilson's lawsuit.

"Too many families across this community feel that pain of loss [from gun violence] everyday, losing loved ones," Benjamin told a large crowd at the Columbia Metropolitan Convention Center. "This is why we will not stop, Mr. Attorney General, working to take illegal guns off the streets of Columbia, South Carolina.

"We're going to take guns off our streets, out of neighborhoods and out of our schools, so that our children can learn and grow with their peers free from fear and free from harm. As we debate politics, some of our children are debating survival."

In the suit, the attorney general references three ordinances Columbia passed in 2019: one that prohibits the possession of firearms within 1,000 feet of a school; another that allows for the seizure of guns from individuals who have an extreme risk protection order against them, commonly known as a “red flag” law; and a third that added so-called "ghost guns" to the city's nuisance laws.

Previously Wilson's office had issued opinions on all three city ordinances, alleging they are unlawful.

The attorney general wrote a letter to Benjamin in December, strongly urging the city to repeal its recently enacted gun laws. Columbia City Council has taken no action toward repealing the ordinances.

"The Office of the Attorney General did not receive a written response to the [ [December] letter, but news media reported that the City respectfully disagreed," the newly filed lawsuit says.

Wilson has repeatedly argued that state statutes dictate that, with few exceptions, state law — not city or county regulations — takes precedence in regard to firearm regulations in South Carolina.

"The Office of the Attorney General has consistently construed ... that the General Assembly intended that state law expressly occupy the entire field of South Carolina firearm regulation and preempt any local ordinance on the same subject, except where local regulations are expressly permitted by those same statutes," the lawsuit reads, in part.

Following his Wednesday night State of the City speech, Benjamin insisted the city's gun laws are lawful.

"The ordinances are not only constitutional, but they are in compliance with state statute," Benjamin told reporters. "We firmly believe that and we'll defend that, whether it's in the Supreme Court or the circuit court."

Wilson also alleges in his suit that Columbia's gun laws are in "conflict with the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution."

Benjamin has been aggressive on gun laws in Columbia. Aside from the aforementioned ordinances, in 2017 he pushed through a city ban on gun bump stocks — devices that can make a semi-automatic weapon perform like an automatic weapon. And he supported Columbia's adoption of ShotSpotter, technology that notifies officers of the location of gunshots in near real time.

The mayor and Columbia Police Chief Skip Holbrook in September also touted more than $745,000 in federal grant funds the city is using specifically to target gun crimes and establish a crime gun intelligence unit.

Back in December, following Wilson's letter urging him to repeal the city's new gun laws, the mayor issued a statement to reporters insisting the city ordinances were lawful, and necessary in a city that has continued to be affected by gun violence.

"The city has a heavy burden to bear when it comes to the safety and well-being of its citizens and many visitors," Benjamin said, at the time. "As mayor and City Council, we have the authority under the South Carolina Constitution, our state Code of Laws, as well as a moral obligation to do whatever is in our power to protect the people and ensure their safety and enjoyment of life.

"With these ordinances we have done so, all within the bounds of State and Federal Law."