Lobbyists in Texas are signing up for concealed handgun permits by droves. Why? It's not that they all want to pack heat when coming to lobby in the Lone Star state Capitol, rather, they found a loophole to skip the long lines at the metal detector:
To avoid getting delayed behind noisy schoolkids waiting in line to pass through new metal detectors at the state Capitol, lobbyists are signing up for concealed handgun permits exempting them from the security checkpoints. [...]
The only people exempted are lawmakers, properly identified state employees or Texans who carry a pistol with a concealed handgun license — or just the license itself, which allows them to bypass the security lines for an express lane reserved for “CHL: Holders.”
“Every lobbyist in Texas is going to become a card-carrying member or a gun-carrying member,” lobbyist and former state lawmaker Pat Haggerty said. “We're going to have more damn guns in here than we know what to do with.
“And there are some lobbyists I don't know whether I'd trust — or trust myself if they're around,” added Haggerty, a Republican who represented El Paso for 20 years. “It would certainly be a good way to do away with the competition.”
There's method to this madness, folks: metal detectors are there to detect guns being furtively smuggled into the State Capitol building. You can openly carry concealed firearms if you take an all-day training class for certification to do so.
No, you can't, at least not in Texas. The CHL is just what it says: a CONCEALED handgun license.
Some states do have open carry laws, but Texas isn't one of them.