States are suing to get 3D gun blueprints offline that have already been downloaded thousands of times

The “crypto-anarchist” who recently won his years-long battle to put blueprints for 3D-printed guns on the internet is now facing mounting legal obstacles from states that believe his products pose a significant threat to public safety.

On Monday, attorneys general from nine different states — Connecticut, District of Columbia, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Pennsylvania, and Washington — filed a multi-state lawsuit seeking to block the settlement between Department of State and 29-year-old Cody Wilson’s company, Defense Distributed.

The settlement, which the Department of Justice decided earlier this month, reversed course on a five-year legal battle and cleared the way for Wilson to resume uploading his gun blueprints to the internet on Aug. 1. Wilson originally sued the government on free speech grounds after State Department officials ordered him to take them down in 2013 or face jail time and hefty fines.

Separately, 21 attorneys general from the nine states previously mentioned — along with those from Colorado, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maine, Minnesota, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Virginia — co-signed a letter on Monday to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that implored them to withdraw from the settlement with Wilson.

“We believe the settlement terms and proposed rules are deeply dangerous and could have an unprecedented impact on public safety,” the letter reads. “In addition to helping arm terrorists and transnational criminals, the settlement and proposed rules would provide another path to gun ownership for people who are prohibited by federal and state law from possessing firearms.”

READ: Gun control groups are racing against the clock to stop 3D gun blueprints from going online

In addition to Monday’s legal challenges, Wilson is personally fighting a lawsuit brought by Pennsylvania officials. But he doesn’t appear too fazed, even though he expects more states to follow suit. “It’s exciting,” he told VICE News Sunday night. “This is how I would prefer to spend my Sundays.”

Pennsylvania’s Attorney General Josh Shapiro, Gov. Tom Wolf, and the Pennsylvania State Police sued Defense Distributed over the weekend seeking to block the dissemination of the files on a national scale, alleging violation of the Federal Gun Control Act of 1986, as well as state laws governing firearm regulation and commerce.

Following an emergency hearing in federal court in Philadelphia Sunday night, Shapiro said Defense Distributed agreed to temporarily block Pennsylvanians from downloading blueprints or uploading new files to the website while the legal matter was pending.

“The harm to Pennsylvanians would have been immediate and irreversible,” Shapiro wrote in a statement. “Once these untraceable guns are on our streets and in our schools, we can never get them back.”

READ: This GOP candidate want to trigger liberals with a 3D gun-part printer giveaway

Wilson’s also spearheading some legal battles of his own. With the backing of the gun rights advocacy groups, the Second Amendment Foundation, Wilson sued New Jersey’s Attorney General Gurbir Grewal and Los Angeles City Attorney Michael Feuer for their legal threats. Both Grewal and Feuer threatened to take legal action against Defense Distributed and Wilson, should they make blueprints for 3D-printed guns available to residents in their jurisdictions.

In the complaint, Wilson accuses Grewal and Feuer of waging “an ideologically-fueled program of intimidation and harassment.”

Wilson set Aug. 1 as the formal rollout date (“good marketing,” he explained), but began uploading files on Friday night. Earlier in the day, a federal judge in Texas rejected a motion for an emergency temporary restraining order brought by several gun control groups.

Since then, his blueprints have been downloaded thousands of times, according to a ticker on the website. The most popular blueprint, with 1,877 downloads, is for “The Liberator,” Wilson’s original 3D-printed gun. The second most popular, with 1,814 downloads, is for an AR-15.

Correction 7/31 6:03 p.m. ET: California has not joined the multi-state lawsuit against the State Department, as materials shared with VICE News erroneously stated. This article has been updated to reflect that 9 states, instead of 10, have joined.

A spokesperson for California Attorney General Xavier Becerra told VICE News that he is, however, "eyeing legal action."

Cover image: Cody Wilson works on the first completely 3D-printed handgun, The Liberator, at his home in Austin on Friday May 10, 2013. (AP Photo/Austin American Statesman, Jay Janner)