Supreme Court turns away Missouri’s bid to revive gun law

The Supreme Court turned away Missouri’s bid to revive its law purporting to declare various federal gun restrictions unconstitutional in the state, the justices announced Monday.

It has become a major battle over state versus federal authority. The Biden administration launched a lawsuit and convinced lower courts that Missouri’s statute violates the Constitution’s Supremacy Clause.

After the change in administration, Trump’s Justice Department maintains that some provisions are unconstitutional.

But it agreed the lower judge went too far in blocking the act’s entirety at the onset. The administration urged the Supreme Court to turn away Missouri’s appeal and send the case back so the injunction can be narrowed.

“That is all the more reason why review by this Court is unwarranted at this juncture,” Solicitor General D. John Sauer wrote in court filings.

Monday’s announcement came on the first day of the Supreme Court’s new term, a year already filled with major battles over race, LGBTQ rights and Trump’s second-term agenda.

The justices considered Missouri’s petition at a closed-door conference last week alongside hundreds of other cases that had piled up over the summer. On Friday, the court announced it will hear a Second Amendment challenge to a Hawaii gun law, which bans concealed carry on private property without the owner’s express permission.

Missouri’s Republican-led Legislature passed the Second Amendment Preservation Act in 2021, declaring certain federal gun laws unconstitutional and prohibits using state resources to enforce them.

Missouri agencies and law enforcement also cannot hire anyone who has attempted to enforce those laws as a federal employee. Private parties can sue over violations and seek up to $50,000 penalties.

The Biden administration challenged the law and won in the lower courts.

The Supreme Court at an earlier stage of the case declined Missouri’s request for an emergency intervention that would enable the law’s enforcement as litigation proceeds. Justice Clarence Thomas, one of the court’s conservatives, publicly dissented.

Back at the high court, Missouri’s petition insisted the law is constitutional and the federal government lacks the right to sue Missouri because the law is enforced by private citizens, not state actors.

Missouri told the justices they should still take up the case to definitively reject the legal challenge, despite the Trump administration’s urging to turn away the appeal.

“The Eighth Circuit’s reasoning is a Pandora’s Box that will misguide lower courts and impose a straitjacket on States,” the state wrote in court filings.

“No wonder the Government refuses to defend it.”

I love it when activist judge with a political agenda get slapped by SCOTUS and have to publicly reverse themselves.

Federal Judge Dismisses Lawsuit Blaming Gun Company for Mass Shooting

A Brady-backed lawsuit against Century Arms blaming a Romanian gun company and a U.S. firearms distributor for the 2019 mass shooting at the Gilroy Garlic Festival in California has finally been dismissed by a federal judge, almost a year after he ruled the case could move forward.

U.S. District Judge William Sessions refused to dismiss the suit in late 2024, arguing that the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act didn’t shield Romarm S.A. and Century Arms because the plaintiffs had “plausibly pled an aiding and abetting theory that satisfied the predicate exception to PLCAA’s liability bar.”

The predicate exception, according to the Supreme Court’s unanimous decision in Smith & Wesson v. Mexcio, requires that defendants “knowingly violated a State or Federal statute applicable to the sale or marketing” of firearms, and the violation “was a proximate cause of the harm for which relief is sought.”

The plaintiffs in the case stemming from the Garlic Festival shooting had argued that Romarm and Century Arms had aided and abetted the shooter’s illegal gun possession in California by selling the WASR-10 that was used in the attack in states where the arm is perfectly legal to own.

Sessions originally accepted that claim under the dubious reasoning that the defendants “knew that California-based criminals were buying guns in Nevada with the illegal intent of transporting them into California,” yet “flooded the Nevada market with guns and employed marketing and pricing strategies with the intent of encouraging or facilitating such transport, not merely with indifference that such transport occurs,” which in turn “aided the commission of illegal gun possession in California.”

But in Smith & Wesson v. Mexico, the Supreme Court stated that any aiding-and-abetting claims that aren’t based on a specific violation of state or federal law “must be backed by plausible allegations of pervasive, systemic, and culpable assistance.” After that decision was handed down Romarm and Century Arms asked Sessions to reconsider his decision, and now the judge has reversed himself and dismissed the case.

The issue for reconsideration, in light of Smith and Wesson, is that none of those findings are particular to the specific incident in this case. The shooter was a Nevada resident at the time of purchase, so his purchase was presumptively legal. Plaintiffs have not alleged with any specificity that Defendants advertised or marketed their products in any way that encouraged the shooter to take his legally purchased firearm across the border to California where it would be illegally possessed.

The oversupply argument similarly fails, as applied to the shooter, because he was a Nevada resident. No matter how many surplus guns were distributed in Nevada beyond what the Nevada market could bear, the fact that the Plaintiff was a part of the Nevada market who was not engaged in some sort of broader trafficking scheme is a flaw in that reasoning.

Put another way, the firearm at the center of this case was not part of an excess supply allegedly flooded into Nevada with the goal of attracting California residents for the simple reason that the shooter was a Nevada resident. So, while Defendants’ act in manufacturing the firearm and marketing it in Nevada may have aided the commission of some illegal gun possession in California, it does not follow, on the facts pled, that they aided the shooter’s illegal gun possession in California “beyond providing the good on the open market.”

It seems to me that Sessions could and should have dismissed the case even before SCOTUS handed down its unanimous decision throwing out Mexico’s lawsuit against Smith & Wesson and other U.S. gunmakers, but the fact that he allowed the case to move forward under such specious claims just demonstrates the importance of the Supreme Court’s decision that helped lay out the scope of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act’s protections.

Sessions, a Clinton appointee who’s served on the bench since 1995, still argued in dismissing the case that “it may well be true” that “Defendants’ acts aided the commission of illegal gun possession in California” in other instances, but the plaintiffs haven’t plausibly proved that to be the case here. That statement was completely superfluous and unnecessary, and appears to telegraph Session’s willingness to punish companies in the firearms industry for the third-party actions of criminals whenever possible. 

In this case, thankfully, Sessions couldn’t get around the plain language of the Supreme Court’s opinion in Smith & Wesson v. Mexico. If it weren’t for that unanimous decision penned by Justice Elena Kagan, though, Brady’s junk lawsuit would still be an ongoing threat to the lawful commerce in arms.

“You know what? Israelis, the assault on the Israelis, people are losing sight of something. People saying that, ‘Oh, the response is gonna be too intense for what happened.’. Well, you don’t get to decide on the response when you do heinous things to civilians. You don’t get to say, ‘Oh, that’s enough, that’s enough retaliation.’ “ – Dee Snider

Most Virginia Dems Sticking By Candidate Who Wanted ‘Two Bullets to the Head” of Republican Lawmaker

The Democratic candidate for Attorney General in Virginia is still getting the support of most party officials and candidates, despite the release of text messages from just three years ago where he said Republican Delegate Todd Gilbert should get “two bullets to the head” as well as wishing harm to Gilbert’s two children.

Jay Jones, a former delegate himself, sent the text messages to Del. Carrie Coyner, and National Review obtained and published the series of deeply disturbing texts a few days ago . The conversation between Jones and the lawmaker took place after former state legislator Joe Johnson, Jr. passed away in August, 2022. Jones was apparently upset that Gilbert and other Republicans were honoring Johnson, who was widely seen as a moderate Democrat.

“If those guys die before me,” Jones wrote, referencing the Republican colleagues who were publicly honoring the deceased Johnson’s memory, “I will go to their funerals to piss on their graves” to “send them out awash in something.”

Jones then suggested that, presented with a hypothetical situation in which he had only two bullets and was faced with the choice of murdering then-Speaker of the House Todd Gilbert or two dictators, he’d shoot Gilbert “every time,” prompting pushback from his former colleague:

Jones: Three people, two bullets Gilbert, hitler, and pol pot

Gilbert gets two bullets to the head

Spoiler: put Gilbert in the crew with the two worst people you know and he receives both bullets every time

Coyner: Jay Please stop

Jones: Lol Ok, ok

Coyner: It really bothers me when you talk about hurting people or wishing death on them It isn’t ok No matter who they are

That’s bad enough, but it gets even worse. According to NR, Jones then called Coyner to try to explain his comments, and at one point argued that the only way to enact public policy changes is when lawmakers “feel pain themselves.”

Then at one point, the source said, he suggested he wished Gilbert’s wife could watch her own child die in her arms so that Gilbert might reconsider his political views, prompting Coyner to hang up the phone in disgust.

Afterward, Jones continued his barrage of text messages, saying he was just asking questions. Coyner dismissed his excuse via text and chastised Jones for “hopping [sic] Jennifer Gilbert’s children would die.”

Rather than deny that he had wished death on the children, Jones responded by saying, “Yes, I’ve told you this before. Only when people feel pain personally do they move on policy.”

Faced with more pushback from his frazzled former colleague, Jones somehow took the conversation a step further: “I mean do I think Todd and Jennifer are evil? And that they’re breeding little fascists? Yes,” he wrote, referring to Gilbert’s wife and two young children.

Despite all of the calls we’ve heard from Democratic politicians about the need to dial down political rhetoric since the assassination of Charlie Kirk, most Democratic candidates in Virginia haven’t demanded that Jones step down after the disgusting views were unveiled. They’ve condemned what Jones had to say, but point to his apology as reason enough to continue backing his campaign to serve as the state’s top law enforcement official.

“I take full responsibility for my actions, and I want to issue my deepest apology to Speaker Gilbert and his family. Reading back those words made me sick to my stomach. I am embarrassed, ashamed, and sorry.”

The statement continues, “I have reached out to Speaker Gilbert to apologize directly to him, his wife Jennifer, and their children. I cannot take back what I said; I can only take full accountability and offer my sincere apology. Virginians deserve honest leaders who admit when they are wrong and own up to their mistakes. This was a grave mistake and I will work every day to prove to the people of Virginia that I will fight for them as Attorney General.”

Jones, however, also told Richmond television station WTVR shortly after releasing that statement taking “full responsibility” for the texts that he’s the victim of a “smear” by Republican Attorney General Jason Miyares and “Trump-controlled media organizations.”

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Abigail Spanberger said she expressed her “disgust” to Jones after learning about the echange with Coyner, but didn’t call on him to drop out of the race. In fact, only one Democratic candidate that I’m aware of has said she wants nothing to do with Jones after his comments became public knowledge.

Good for Hayes, though given the makeup of the House district where she’s running, she’s an underdog even without Jones’ comments potentially serving as a drag on Democratic candidates.

Jones, it should be noted, was a staunch champion of gun control during his time in the Virginia Assembly and has been endorsed by Everytown for Gun Safety, which has yet to make any statement about one of their “gunsense” candidates hoping for the death of a Republican lawmaker’s children.

To say that these comments demonstrate that Jones lacks the character and temperament to serve as Attorney General is an understatement. This wasn’t a “mistake” by Jones. He had multiple opportunities at the time he sent those messages to think and reflect on what he was saying. Instead of being embarrassed, ashamed, or sorry, he doubled down. He apparently never apologized to Gilbert at any point in the three years since he made those comments, though he had to have known they would get back to the lawmaker and his family. Only when these abhorrent comments were made did he decide it was time to apologize for, among other things, wanting one or both of the Gilbert’s children to die in their mom’s arms so that maybe her husband would vote for a gun control bill in the future.

I’ve seen some folks suggest that Jones’ comments would be enough to get the supporter of “red flag” laws served with an Extreme Risk Protection Order of his own, but I don’t think that’s the case. Jones never said that he himself wanted to harm Gilbert or his kids, even while wishing for their death. I don’t believe those statements prove that Jones is too dangerous to own a gun, but I definitely believe that they show he’s too dangerous to serve in public office, especially in the role of Attorney General.

@TonemanLives

What are the real reasons Dem leaders do not want Trump to send in reinforcements to clean up these dangerous drug filled, crime ridden cities?

The first reaction is, they don’t want to be embarrassed. They don’t want to look weak and or be exploited for their wrongdoings

But there is a reason for all of it. The lack of policing, lack of arrests, lack of protecting the people.

These corrupt loud mouth corrupt politicians aren’t worried about being embarrassed. Hell, they’re Democrats and never show or feel any shame.

What they are truly worried about is Trump coming in and cleaning up their shitholes. Why? Because these dirty scumbags need this. All of this to survive.

I’m talking about the Dem leadership needs these areas for political control. The worse the area the more money gets pumped in. The more money that comes in the more money they get to control. Just look at the war chests of every one of these politicians in these disgusting 3rd war cities.

It’s right out of the Dem playbook. Money and control. Dems would rather rule over the ashes as long as their money flow continues

The Dems never care about the people. Show me any instance anywhere, where the Dems went in and did something good. Show me a place that the Dems made safer or a place where they are taking criminals off the streets and incarcerating them for long periods of time.

You won’t find any because there aren’t any. The Dems thrive on crime. Crime is good for business. Crime is good for politics.

The Dems are masters at playing with crime numbers and know exactly what it takes to keep getting voted in. They purposely keep the numbers down and are in control of their police departments. They tell them who to arrest and who not to bother. Their control goes beyond the people, it also goes to every state agency they are a part of

You lie about how much you care for the people, you continue to give them crumbs just to survive. You promise as long as you are there you will take care of the people. Then you lie about the crime numbers and tell the people that crime is down even though none of them feel it.

It’s called control. As long as things are bad these politicians thrive. They are masters at it and have been doing this for many years.

What do the scared citizens do? They go out and continue to vote for these same recycled scumbags.

They are afraid of change, and afraid to lose what little they get from these corrupt scumbags. There is a reason this has been a rinse and repeat operation for all these years. It keeps their political carousel turning. It keeps them getting reelected.

Now look at the other side of the equation. Trump comes in and what couldn’t be done in decades because the Dem leadership made them all believe that lie, Trump comes in, conquers and cleans up their shithole in a couple of weeks.

What happens next? The people who were lied to and told what couldn’t be done is not only all of a sudden fixed but they suddenly realize they have been lied to the entire time.

They realize the cities they fear to live in didn’t have to be that way. For the first time in their lives they will know what safety is, what drugs taken off the streets feels like, what living their lives and walking safely down the streets feels like.

Trump coming in and doing a major cleanup in these battle ridden cities is bad for business for the Democrats. It is bad for their party. This is what they fund off of. People living in fear. Once Trump eliminates the fear, Dems are no longer wanted. In fact these lost Americans will finally find their way. They will finally be contributing to society, a society they were all taught they would never be a part of.

Trump is decimating the Dems in more ways than one. These cities which are predominately black are all opening their eyes and it is all because of Trump. That is why Trump’s popularity is at all time highs with the black community. Trump is getting it done. Trust the process. My two cents

Stupidity cannot be cured with money, or through education, or by legislation. Stupidity is not a sin, the victim can’t help being stupid. But stupidity is the only universal capital crime: the sentence is death, there is no appeal, and execution is carried out automatically and without pity. ― Robert Heinlein

Violence and the Left’s Five-Part Strategy

President Trump’s designation of Antifa as a “major terrorist organization” is a major step in dealing with the epidemic of left-wing violence that has gripped the country.  For the first time, we have a president who understands that riots with pallets of bricks that show up at just the right time and place, attacks on law enforcement and on passing motorists, physical attacks on opponents and even assassination do not just arise organically but instead are all part of a larger subversive strategy that enables and supports the left’s violence.

Just prosecuting a violent leftist here and there without countering that subversive strategy is like swatting a mosquito or two while leaving in place the pool of stagnant water that breeds them. Consequently, the president’s executive order recognizes that any effort to stop left-wing violence has to address the larger ideological, organizational, and financial feeder system that breeds and incites that violence.

Now comes the challenge for mainstream Americans.  The radical left knows that the political will to carry out President Trump’s directive will depend on continuing support from mainstream America, and so the left will mount a counter-offensive to wear away public support for any attempt to counter the left’s subversion.  If you think leftists get unhinged when someone simply disagrees with them, wait until you see their reaction when their support network is investigated, their funding is threatened, and they feel exposed and cornered. The left-wing media and elected Democrats who supported the weaponization of government against peaceful opponents during the Obama and Biden administrations have already started a propaganda campaign with cries of “fascism” and “dictatorship” at the prospect of leftists being held accountable for inciting and committing political violence.

To hold fast in the face of the left’s counter-offensive, mainstream Americans need to see how the pieces of the left’s strategy work together to demoralize and destabilize our system of government. In his must-read book, The Memo: Twenty Years Inside the Deep State Fighting for America First, Rich Higgins describes in detail the pattern of subversion that he encountered within America’s security apparatus and his attempt to warn President Trump about it. In addition to a shocking account of delay and subversion from within the deep state, Higgins also reveals in this book and in his other work how leftist violence is only one of five lines of effort in the Maoist approach to political warfare. Expanding on his work, we see the outlines of the left’s five-part strategy:

(1) Forming alliances of grievance groups:  Socialists, radical feminists, minorities, gender identity groups, climate extremists, Islamists, and other grievance groups are pulled together toward a common aim, the destruction of the Judeo-Christian foundations of America and the West.  Supported by a complex web of foreign and domestic funding, conflicting interests such as those of the LGBT movement and those promoting sharia law are tempered—at least for now—by that shared aim.

(2) Non-violent action: Many of the left’s tactics are non-violent in themselves but promote a dangerous climate for anyone who disagrees with their authoritarian agenda. Condemnatory terms such as “homophobic,” “Islamophobic,” “transphobic,” or “fascist” and characterizing opposing opinions as driven by hate are all intended to intimidate and silence any viewpoints deemed politically incorrect by the radical left. Boycotts of companies that don’t toe the party line as well as deplatforming and debanking of opponents create a climate of fear and send a clear message that you will pay if you cross the left.

(3) Violent action and intimidation: The above tactics provide propaganda air cover for looting, riots, attacks on people who disagree, and even assassination as supposedly legitimate means of bringing down “fascists” and the hateful and oppressive system they support. As was the case with the paramilitary Red Guard in China, we see that young people are particularly enticed to join in the destruction of the existing cultural and political order.

(4)  Sanctuary:  Subversive actors need safe spaces where they can be encouraged and protected from the consequences of their actions, and so speech codes and leftist indoctrination in our education system make it clear that only left-wing opinions are permissible and that open exploration of ideas should not be tolerated.  Left-wing DAs who view criminals as victims and victims as oppressors release dangerous offenders on the street, undermining public trust in government protection.

(5) Direct political action: The above tactics then enable the election of radical leftists who use the formal power of government to attack and undermine our constitutional system. You don’t’ have to search long to see a number of public officials who already spout the Marxist line under the cover of “progressive” or “democratic socialist” labels.

When we see the full extent of the left’s multi-front campaign of subversion, it becomes clear that only a multi-front response such as that in President Trump’s directive has any hope of protecting public safety and restoring our ability to have civil discussion of differences without threats of violence from the left.  When you hear the left bemoaning “weaponization” of government, remember that an age-old tactic of the left is to accuse their opponents of what the left actually does.

Dr. Tim Daughtry is co-author of Waking the Sleeping Giant: How Mainstream Americans Can Beat Liberals at Their Own Game.  F

Trump on the Verge of Ending the Israel-Hamas War, and the Left Is Furious About It.

It’s one of the strangest spectacles in modern politics — watching left-wing pundits struggle to process the possibility that President Donald Trump could be on the verge of ending the Israel–Hamas war.

Trump and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu shocked the world with a bold peace plan to end the Israel–Hamas war and stabilize Gaza. On Friday, Trump gave Hamas a deadline — accept the deal by Sunday at 6 p.m. Eastern or face consequences. Hamas quickly responded, agreeing to give up control of Gaza and release all remaining hostages, while saying some details still required consultation with other Palestinian factions. Trump’s firm deadline and direct approach have already accomplished what years of empty diplomacy never could — real progress toward peace.

But, rather than celebrate the prospect of peace, some commentators seem triggered by the idea that Trump, of all people, might succeed where countless global leaders have failed.

On the latest edition of CNN’s Newsnight, foreign affairs analyst Reena Nina laid out the complex diplomatic environment surrounding the ongoing negotiations. “This is a moment where you’ve got so many of the right things lined up,” she said, noting that regional pressure on Hamas has intensified. “In the Arab world, there’s a — I’m hearing a great deal of pressure from countries like, you know, Turkey and Qatar, saying to Hamas, you’ve got to do this and take this deal.”

Nina added that Hamas “realizes there aren’t a lot of windows of opportunity for this,” referencing the earlier Gilad Shalit prisoner swap. “You’re waiting for 20 hostages that are living, that we believe are still alive and possibly as many as 30 bodies,” she explained. Then she made a striking admission: “I do believe this window of opportunity is real… because I really believe President Trump. I really believe he will unleash hell and fury if they don’t follow through with this.”

Even CNN host Abby Phillip couldn’t deny the implications if this pans out. “If President Trump is able to do this, this is a major—it’s a major victory for him,” she said, before quickly pivoting to suggest Trump’s motives might not be purely humanitarian. “He wants the war to end for a lot of reasons. Some of them are personal reasons. He wants that Nobel Peace Prize,” Phillip said. But even she conceded that Trump “does not like the idea of all the death and destruction.”

That’s when the tone shifted from analysis to thinly veiled resentment. Liberal commentator Alencia Johnson admitted it was “challenging to actually hear that piece of, you know, Trump being—potentially being the one to get the ceasefire deal.” Her discomfort was palpable. “I would be interested to understand President Trump’s interest in this,” she said, suggesting skepticism about his motives. “He has said some things that are very harmful to the Palestinian people. I don’t know, you know, what his motivations are.”

Imagine being so consumed with Trump Derangement Syndrome that you’d actually lament the prospect of peace simply because it might make Trump look good. Alencia Johnson’s comments captured this perfectly — the left’s reflexive inability to acknowledge any Trump success, even one that could save lives. Ending a brutal war and bringing home hostages should be something everyone celebrates, yet Trump’s critics sound almost offended that he might be the one to accomplish it.

CNN’s Scott Jennings was having none of it. “This is not a political issue,” he said bluntly. “Look, President Trump has been clear from the beginning he wants the hostages back.” Jennings reminded viewers that Trump “had an initial deal to get some hostages” soon after taking office in January, but that “Hamas reneged on that deal.”

“He’s been clear from the beginning,” Jennings said. “I just want these people back. The people who are alive, we pray that they’re still alive, the remains that exist — it all needs to happen and it needs to happen quickly.”

He didn’t mince words about Hamas either: “I don’t want to be strung along by these terrorists. I want the hostages. That’s what the President wants. And I don’t want him to give them very much time because they don’t deserve it and these people need to come home. We’re almost two years into this.”


Even CNN’s own analysts couldn’t deny the magnitude of the moment, yet the left’s sheer disgust at the possibility of Trump succeeding was unmistakable. You could practically hear the resentment in their voices — not because peace might finally be within reach, but because Trump might get the credit. That’s the sickness at the heart of modern leftism: they would rather see war drag on, hostages remain in tunnels, and innocent people suffer than admit that President Trump’s leadership is delivering results they could only dream of. It’s petty, it’s ideological, and it’s downright shameful.