Category: RKBA

Looking Forward to the U.S. Supreme Court Standing Behind Its Bruen Ruling

“A year ago today, the Supreme Court ruled to strip away the rights of a governor to protect her people from concealed carry weapons. We refused to go backwards,” tweeted New York Gov. Kathy Hochul (D) on June 23.

This tweet—and other statements from Gov. Hochul—is an admission she is obstructing a U.S. Supreme Court ruling.

In New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. v. Bruen, an NRA-backed case, the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed that the Second Amendment protects the right of law-abiding citizens to carry a firearm for personal protection when it struck the “proper cause” requirement in New York’s Sullivan Law.

In doing so, the Supreme Court clearly declared that the government cannot trample on our Second Amendment rights through “abusive” permitting schemes.

Nevertheless, people barely had time to read the Bruen decision before Gov. Hochul and the New York state legislature blatantly stepped all over the ruling with the inappropriately named Concealed Carry Improvement Act.

Although the Concealed Carry Improvement Act doesn’t require citizens demonstrate they have a proper cause to carry firearms, it banned carry almost everywhere with unconstitutional “sensitive-place” restrictions. Also, citizens applying to the state for their constitutional right to bear arms must first take a 16-hour training class, including a two-hour live-fire session. Then they must have an in-person interview with a licensing officer where they must disclose several types of personal information, including all of their social-media accounts. The officer then reviews that information to determine if the applicant has “good moral character,” which is even more subjective than the unconstitutional “proper cause” standard. The licensing officer then has up to six months—unless they want more time, which they will be granted indefinitely—to pore through the applicant’s information to determine if that individual is “eligible” for a license.

When Gov. Hochul was asked where people could carry under the gun-control law, she said “probably some streets.”

As a result, the NRA sued.

The state’s Concealed Carry Improvement Act “replaces one unconstitutional, discretionary law with another unconstitutional, discretionary law,” the NRA lawsuit says. “The [law] contains a slew of burdensome and discriminatory requirements for obtaining a Handgun Carry License—violating the First, Second, Fourth, and Fourteenth Amendments—and an additional slew of restrictions on where and how Handgun Carry License holders may exercise their right to carry arms outside the home.”

Gov. Hochul’s tweet also admits something else. By saying that, in Bruen, the “Supreme Court ruled to strip away the rights of a governor to protect her people from concealed carry weapons,” Gov. Hochul is blaming guns for crimes. She can’t really believe that guns are acting on their own to commit crimes. She likely knows that people (in this case, criminals) commit crimes. So her job is then to protect law-abiding people from violent criminals, not to disarm good citizens who merely want to protect themselves. Given that simple logic, she should next realize that a lot of criminal law (state and federal) gives law enforcement and prosecutors a lot of tools to arrest and put away felons and other prohibited persons who are carrying firearms. It then seems logical that she should focus state resources on the actual problem.

After all, it seems fair to assume that Gov. Hochul is capable of understanding the basic idea that criminals commit crimes and therefore, to prevent more crimes, the state needs to find and prosecute criminals.

The fact that Gov. Hochul has decided to disingenuously virtue signal about crime—by literally blaming good citizens for the actions of criminals—should be clearly said in New York state’s newspapers and on its local news broadcasts. But it isn’t. Too many in the media are also playing this “blame-freedom, not criminals” political game. And this is a shame, as good policy can only come from open and honest debate.

For this reason, the NRA’s court challenge to this unconstitutional law is doubly important.

Illinois assault weapons ban goes to 7th Circuit Court of Appeals

CHICAGO (WLS) — Gun control was on the docket in a federal courtroom in Chicago Thursday.

Illinois assault weapons ban went before the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals. The popularity of the weapons the law proposes to ban could play a crucial role in the decision.

Assault-style rifles like the popular AR-15 remain hanging on gun store walls while the fate of the state ban hangs in the balance.

Thursday a three-member panel hear arguments from attorneys involved in six consolidated lawsuits challenging the ban. Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Hunger argued for the state and said of the AR-15, “These are not in common use for self-defense.” They are instead, she said, “offensive and militaristic.”

Supporters of the state’s assault weapons ban, including a survivor of the Highland Park parade shooting, rallied outside the courthouse.

“Gun violence and mass shootings affect entire communities,” said Ashbey Beasley, Highland Park shooting survivor.

Erin murphy, representing many gun groups, argued, “Our history and tradition is one of protecting weapons that are in common use today.”

Americans own an estimated 24 million AR-15s.

In response, Judge Diane Wood noted, “It’s unusual to have a popularity contest determine what is constitutional.”

“It ought not to be just a popularity contest in time, right,” said Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul.

But plaintiffs, including the owner of Naperville’s Law Weapons and Supply store, said the ban was about penalizing many law abiding gun owners for the heinous crimes of a few, and this fight is far from over.

“It’s illegal, and it’s hurting us, you know, and I’m tired and we’re gonna fight ’til the end,” said Robert Bevis, owner of Law Weapons and Supply. “Right now, we believe, we’re confident we’re gonna win here at the appellate court, and if we don’t we’re gonna take it to the Supreme Court.”

What is unclear at this point is how soon the Court of Appeals will issue a ruling. Judge Easterbook said this is an extremely difficult problem and the court was going to take it under advisement.

COURT’S IN SESSION
WE’RE LEARNING THERE IS JUSTICE FOR THE 2A

Attorneys specializing in Second Amendment cases are a busy bunch these days, sometimes filing lawsuits challenging new gun laws even before the ink is dry.

For those who have been waiting for the right to keep and bear arms to get a fair shake, it appears that time is finally arriving. As this column was being written, various gun rights organizations were in court all over the place, including Illinois, New Jersey, Maryland, New York, Texas and California. The bulk of these cases are in federal court since they all have Second Amendment components.

For example, the Second Amendment Foundation, which has become something of a spear point over the past few years, now has more than 50 active cases, with more on the way.

While anti-gun lawmakers have been scrambling to push through as many restrictive gun laws as possible this year, SAF, the National Rifle Association, National Shooting Sports Foundation, Firearms Policy Coalition and Gun Owners of America have been moving just as fast to block implementation of those laws in the courts.

Oregon is a prime example, where four federal lawsuits were filed following last November’s passage of a very restrictive gun control initiative — Measure 114 — by a razor thin margin.

In neighboring California, there are several legal actions in progress, including one filed recently by SAF, the Firearms Policy Coalition, North County Shooting Center, San Diego County Gun Owners PAC, California Gun Rights Foundation, PWGG LLP, and private citizens John Phillips, Alisha Curtin, Dakota Adelphia, Michael Schwartz, Darin Prince and Claire Richards.

This legal action is known as Richards v. Bonta, and it strikes right at the heart of the textbook example of arbitrary gun control, California’s 10-day waiting period on firearm purchases.

What’s With The Number 10?
I’ll guess with you on this one: Why is 10 the right number for anything? It’s typically the maximum number of cartridges the gun control crowd thinks belong in a pistol or rifle magazine. It’s also the number of days they think people should wait in order to exercise a constitutionally-protected, fundamental right.

SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut had an interesting observation about this. In a prepared statement, he offered, “Where this really gets silly is when the waiting period restriction even applies to a gun buyer who already owns other firearms. Not to mention, those who are looking to acquire a firearm for protection immediately do not have the luxury of waiting ten days. Long story short, the state’s ten-day waiting period must be declared unconstitutional and enjoined, which is the purpose of our lawsuit. We’re asking the court for injunctive and declaratory relief.”

Nobody can explain why the number 10 is popular with gun control
zealots who want to limit magazine capacity to 10 cartridges. Dave’s
Ruger MKIV magazines hold that number, but he didn’t have to wait
10 days to take it home from the retailer!

A practicing attorney, Kraut’s got a point. Someone who already owns firearms doesn’t need a new one to cause trouble if that’s his or her intent. And looking back at history, one sees plenty of examples where waiting 10 days didn’t prevent anything. Elliot Rodger, for example, spent months preparing for his rampage in Isla Vista. He bought three different handguns, enduring three separate California waiting periods, and when he finally did erupt in May 2014, he used only California compliant 10-round magazines.

Washington Gov. Jay Inslee signed legislation some weeks ago also establishing a 10-day waiting period. Nobody knows why “10” is the magic number.

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New Jersey Attorney General Platkin whines like a baby about gun owners

Platty-kins, Platty-kins, unconstitutional man.
Execute me a law as fast as you can.
Lie about it, double down on it, and mark it with a “D.”
Keep it on the books for Danielsen and me!

Well there you have it; the Attorney General of New Jersey’s official nursery rhyme. Just when the patriots thought that Matt “Stuart” Platkin couldn’t get any more swampy or whiney, he sends out this whiny little tweet over all his social media channels!

Okay Plattykins, we’re rest assured. Rest assured you and the rest of the swamp creatures are in over their heads. The awful law, allegedly written by Assemblyman Joe Danielsen (I highly doubt Danielsen has the mental capacity to write something like the “carry-killer” bill by himself) has hit a minor speed bump on its journey to be overruled. The AG should be well aware that this is just a procedural thing, and that the stay on the injunction of New Jersey’s law is likely going to be reversed. This really only has to do with the fact the state asked for an emergency stay.

The state’s case is meritless. Attorney Daniel Schmutter mapped out everything that needs to be known about sensitive locations during the preliminary injunction hearing for the consolidated cases challenging this garbage law:

As Your Honor is aware, we so far have only seen one thing that gets you a sensitive place. That’s “governance.” And it’s actually narrower than government functions, because as Your Honor knows, the State claims that libraries and museums and all that stuff is government functions. It’s the function of governance. Legislatures, courthouses, polling places, those are the three Bruen sensitive places.

The policies that Platkin, Murphy, et.al. pushed for have no historical analogues. The insurance mandate, the ban on carry in the car, the fee hikes – all of it baseless and only enacted to make it more difficult on the law-abiding. Platkin is tired of defending himself because his position is indefensible. Why is he whining so much about this all of a sudden? Because he probably realizes he’s losing and has over caffeinated crazed Karens crawling up his two-hole. The guy screaming “I’m not crazy,” as he’s being whisked out of the room, usually is…well you know.

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NY Gov. Kathy Hochul packs incredible gun control lies and claims into a 58-second video

I live in New York, which is one of the worst states to be a lawful gun owner and a taxpaying citizen. The proof is in the pudding; people vote with their feet when life becomes intolerable due to poor governance, and New York’s allegedly wonderful governance resulted in the loss of yet another congressional seat after the 2020 redistricting cycle.

It is grating to see Gov. Kathy Hochul still bragging about New York as some sort of bastion of freedom and opportunity in the face of the evidence of outmigration. Part of her braggadocio was a video her office posted on Twitter, discussing all the “good” she has done to keep the people of New York “safe from concealed carry weapons.”

First, you don’t have “rights” as a governor; you have powers to govern, and those powers are limited so they don’t violate the rights of the people.

Second, your job is to protect the people’s rights and liberties, and your matriarchal view on “protecting her people” is condescending bunk. Lastly, concealed carry weapons in and of themselves don’t do anything. It depends on who is carrying them. Criminals were carrying concealed weapons prior to NYSRPA v. Bruen and continue to carry after NYSRPA v. Bruen. However, ordinary people’s rights to carry guns in public were infringed by New York State’s discretionary permitting scheme.

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Maine House narrowly pass bill to require background checks on private gun sales

AUGUSTA, Maine (WABI) – A bill that would require background checks on private gun sales narrowly passed in the Maine House today.

The vote was 69 to 68.

While the state currently requires a background check for commercial gun purchases from licensed dealers, supporters of this bill say it would close a loophole that allows those who are prohibited from having a gun to buy one through a private sale or at a gun show.

Opponents of the bill argue it would impose more restrictions on law abiding citizens while having no impact on public safety, violent crimes, or gun deaths.

“Our failure to do background checks contributes to gun related tragedies around this state, domestic violence deaths as well as a robust guns for drug trade exists where narcotics, opioids, fentanyl, and other illegal substances are trafficked into the state and traded for guns,” Rep. Victoria Doudera of Camden said in support of the bill.

“Madam Speaker, the people of Maine do not want universal background checks, and they definitely would not want them when coupled with universal registration. How can we be sure of this Madam Speaker? It’s because they told us in a people’s referendum when they soundly defeated universal background checks. The people told us this even when the papers and the polls at the time told us that over 80% of Maine voters wanted it,” Rep. Chad Perkins of Dover-Foxcroft said in opposition of the bill.

That citizen referendum to expand background checks was defeated by Maine voters in 2016, 52 to 48 percent.

The bill now head to the Senate.

New laws in Vermont that start July 1: Gun purchases,….

Vermonters will soon see new laws that affect their wallets or their legal choices — and even possibly cut down on the theft of car parts.

Every year, July 1 is the date that many new laws take effect. Some of these laws were recently passed by the Legislature; others were approved a while ago and are just now rolling out.

Here are 11 of the changes you should know about this summer.

Waiting period for gun purchases

Young people in Vermont are less likely than their peers in other states to report feelings of sadness, hopelessness or suicidal thoughts — and yet their rate of suicide deaths is higher than the national average.

Lawmakers have decided that easy access to guns is a significant factor in those deaths. And legislation that goes into effect July 1 will institute a 72-hour waiting period for gun purchases. Lawmakers hope that preventing someone in crisis from gaining immediate access to a gun will allow time for suicidal impulses to pass. The vast majority of people who survive a suicide attempt never make an attempt again.

A new law in Vermont creates a criminal penalty for unsafe storage of firearms if those guns are used in a crime.

The law will allow family members to petition courts for an extreme risk protection order, and creates a new criminal penalty for negligent storage of firearms, if that negligence results in commission of a crime.

The 72-hour waiting period provision is almost certain to invite a legal challenge. In a landmark ruling last year, the U.S. Supreme Court established a new precedent for the manner in which courts should assess the constitutionality of restrictions on gun ownership.

Though Gov. Phil Scott allowed the bill to become law, he said he doesn’t think the 72-hour waiting period will survive a constitutional challenge.

[It makes one wonder why the goobernor let it become law then, but scratch a lib, find a tyrant applies]

Honolulu, state of Hawaii coughs up six figures to sailor forced to give up his guns over mental health counseling

To be honest, I’ve got mixed feelings about this. While I’m glad that the city of Honolulu and the state of Hawaii are being forced to cut a check to Michael Santucci, the roughly $130,000 he’ll receive after his Second Amendment rights were violated doesn’t seem nearly enough to make up for the harm that was done to him.

Santucci was an active duty member of the Navy in 2021 when he sought a permit to possess a firearm in the home. After acknowledging that he had recently received mental health counseling, his application was rejected by the Honolulu PD on the grounds that he’d allegedly admitted to a significant mental health disorder. Not only was his permit denied, but the firearms he had previously lawfully purchased were seized by the Honolulu police.

In truth, Santucci was homesick, and simply wanted to talk to a counselor at Tripler Army Medical Center. Santucci ended up suing after his permit was rejected, and last year a federal judge ruled in his favor, declaring that Santucci had not demonstrated any sort of significant mental health disorder that would disqualify him under the Hawaii law while leaving the statute itself untouched.

After the judge’s ruling, the city and state settled with Santucci. The state of Hawaii agreed to fork over some $28,000 for Santucci’s trouble, while the city of Honolulu agreed to a $102,000 figure. Santucci still hasn’t received a check from the city, but it looks like one will soon be cut.

A Honolulu City Council committee Tuesday approved the city’s portion of the settlement — $102,500 — which goes to the full council next month.

The lawsuit by Michael Santucci alleged that the HPD seized his guns and that it held up his permit application in 2021 because he wrote down on his firearms questionnaire that he had recently received mental health counseling.

His lawyer said police had violated Santucci’s constitutional rights.

“Mr. Santucci’s case sort of demonstrates the attitude that HPD has toward people owning firearms. I think they view it really more as a privilege rather than a constitutional right,” said Santucci’s lawyer Alan Beck.

I’d say that’s an understatement on Beck’s part, and it’s not just limited to the city of Honolulu or its police department. As we reported earlier this week, local departments like the Honolulu PD are denying permits to anyone who possesses a medical marijuana card, and Gov. Josh Brown recently signed a carry-killer bill that prohibits lawful concealed carry in the vast majority of publicly accessible spaces, including all businesses by default.

The Democrats in charge of Hawaii’s government are doing everything they can to keep the islands gun-free and have displayed no concern or consternation about treading over a fundamental constitutional right in the process.

Because of Santucci’s legal actions the city of Honolulu has changed its questions on the firearms permit application, which will hopefully prevent this particular infringement from happening in the future. When it comes to getting the state to actually start treating the right to keep and bear arms as the fundamental right that it is, however, attorneys like Alan Beck and organizations like the Hawaii Firearms Coalition and the Hawaii Rifle Association still have their work cut out for them.

Always with the ‘but’………
Makes you wonder what he thinks about rights protected by the 4th and 5th amendments.

Tulsa police chief suggests nation transform response to gun violence

As mass shootings plague the country, Tulsa’s police chief is comparing the violence to 9/11 and urging a more comprehensive response. KWGS’ Max Bryan sat down with Chief Wendell Franklin for StateImpact. Please note, both the audio and transcript have been edited for length and clarity.

MAX BRYAN: So to begin, after the Saint Francis shooting, you said you would leave gun laws up to the state legislature, but by the end of that month, you had told media outlets that permitless carry was causing problems in Tulsa, and you reiterated that point after the mass shooting at Allen Outlet Mall in Texas last month. So my first question is what led you to decide to speak out?

WENDELL FRANKLIN: Well, because I don’t think that we’re moving the needle on anything. If you compare what we’re faced with 9/11, 9/11 occurred and it totally transformed America, totally transformed how you travel on airlines. No longer can you go to the terminal and see a loved one off or see someone come back. All of that is a sterile area. The federal government took over all airline security and there was this more robust effort to deal with and address some of the terrorist activities that were taking place. Fast forward to even structures, how structures were built, no longer are you building structures that have parking garages that you can access underneath a building. You can’t do that anymore. Today, all of that’s controlled. And any future buildings, those are not even a part of the actual building structure. They move those off to the side now, and here we are today, where we’ve recognized that we have some issues that need to be addressed, and we are operating as though everything is normal, and I don’t think everything is normal.

MB: So you’ve also criticized a lack of regulation of untraceable ghost guns and straw purchasing. Recently you indicated you would support regulating the purchasing of high-powered weapons like AR-15s. Is there anything you can add to that list today?

WF: Ultimately, I’m a Second Amendment guy. I own guns of course. But I’m okay giving up some of that freedom, right? We had to give up some of that freedom after 9/11. I’m okay with waiting three days, five days, or whatever to get my firearm if I go out and purchase another firearm. So I’m okay with a pause to allow for weapons to be purchased and allow the government and the gun companies to look at the background and do a thorough check before that gun goes to someone.

MB: Have you spoken to any members of the legislature about our state’s gun laws?

WF: In passing, I have. It’s a topic that’s not really brought up a whole lot and it’s something that gets glossed over quite a bit.

MB: How have those conversations gone?

WF: It’s an immediate pivot to some other topic. No one really wants to talk about it.

MB: Okay. So in December, you told me the second amendment was tricky. How do you balance challenges, or excuse me, changes that you believe will prevent crime with enforcing laws made by lawmakers who believe the second amendment means expanding firearm access?

WF: Ultimately, law enforcement, we are the experts. We’re the subject matter experts at protecting America, right? Protecting our cities. We should be utilized in that manner. I am charged with protecting this community. And if there are better ways of protecting it, I think we should be looking at those better ways to protect it. Anything that we do, ultimately, we give up something to have that protection. You know, we put seatbelt laws in place, I’m not exactly sure when, probably the 1980s, I think. And we mandated that everyone starts wearing a seatbelt, and it took some time for people to grab hold of that. But if you look today it is an automatic thing that people put on their seatbelt when they get into a vehicle. You feel uncomfortable not wearing that seatbelt. I think again, we give something up to get safety for, for something safe. I think that’s where we are today. We are going to have to give up some things. And I think there are some things that we can give up for a safer community.

 

Silencers/Suppressors are in Common Use for Lawful Purposes

U.S.A. — The number of legal suppressors or silencers in the United States shows they are in common use for lawful purposes.  As of January of 2023, the ATF shows there were over 3.1 million silencers or suppressors legally owned in the United States for lawful purposes. In January of 2020, there were 1.8 million. Over the last three years, the number of legal suppressors has increased by an average of 450,000 suppressors per year. By the end of 2023, it is reasonably expected there will be over 3.6 million suppressors in the United States of America. To own these suppressors, the owners have gone through a complicated and lengthy process, often taking a year or more to process their applications for tax stamps. The federal government requires tax stamps to purchase a silencer legally.

In District of Columbia v. Heller (2008), the U.S. Supreme Court held that the Second Amendment protects “arms ‘in common use at the time’ for lawful purposes like self-defense” and arms that are “typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.” Such arms are “chosen by American society,” not the government.

Silencers/Suppressors are in Common Use for Lawful Purposes
Silencers/Suppressors are in Common Use for Lawful Purposes

American society chooses what arms are in common use. The government does not make the choices. By choosing to possess arms, the people choose what is in common use. It is the possession of the arms which determines whether they are in common use or not.  Possession of arms is a use of the arms. In Heller, the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) ruled:

The Second Amendment extends, prima facie, to all instruments that constitute bearable arms, even those that were not in existence at the time of the founding.

In the Caetano decision, the Heller pronouncement was emphasized and magnified. When an arm was invented has nothing to do with whether it is protected under the Second Amendment. What matters is if the arm is in common use for lawful purposes. This was particularly emphasized by Justice Alito and Justice Thomas. From Caetano, concurrence by Justice Alito, joined with Justice Thomas:

The more relevant statistic is that “[h]undreds of thousands of Tasers and stun guns have been sold to private citizens,” who it appears may lawfully possess them in 45 States. People v. Yanna, 297 Mich. App. 137, 144, 824 N. W. 2d 241, 245 (2012) (holding Michigan stun gun ban unconstitutional); see Volokh, Nonlethal Self-Defense, (Almost Entirely) Nonlethal Weapons, and the Rights To Keep and Bear Arms and Defend Life, 62 Stan. L. Rev. 199, 244 (2009) (citing stun gun bans in seven States); Wis. Stat. §941.295 (Supp. 2015) (amended Wisconsin law permitting stun gun possession); see also Brief in Opposition 11 (acknowledging that “approximately 200,000 civilians owned stun guns” as of 2009). While less popular than handguns, stun guns are widely owned and accepted as a legitimate means of self-defense across the country. Massachusetts’ categorical ban of such weapons therefore violates the Second Amendment.

This was the first time SCOTUS put a number on what is “common use.”  Some may consider two hundred thousand items in the United States of America high, but this applies to many items. When legal suppressors were nearly banned by taxes of ten times the price of the item ($20 would buy most suppressors; the tax was/is $200), there were far fewer of them. In 2006, there were 150 thousand legally owned silencers in the USA.  Sometime between 2006 and 2011, the 200 thousand mark was passed. ATF records do not seem to be available from 2006 to 2010. In 2011, there were 285 thousand legal silencers.

The ATF and Biden administration’s strategy is to claim silencers are not “arms” but are only an accessory. It is difficult to see how they can claim silencers are not “arms” but are very dangerous.

The Texas case, Paxton v. Richardson, appears to be the most likely case to resolve this issue at this time.  In the case, Texas Attorney General Paxton has argued the common use, Second Amendment case, as well as persuasive arguments against the use of taxation to attack rights protected by the Second Amendment.

Judge Mark Pitmann heard the parties’ cross-motions for summary judgment in the case on June 15, 2023.

But even the politicians on our side of the equation don’t seem to get it.
The 2nd amendment gives the people nothing.
The people already possess the right to keep and bear arms.
The people have had this right even before the U.S. was the U.S.!
The amendment restricts government power.

Bump stock ban heads to SCOTUS

The U.S. Supreme Court is getting a chance to weigh in on the ATF’s ban on bump stocks imposed after the Las Vegas shooting in 2018, with the Firearms Policy Coalition filing a Petition for a Writ of Certiorari with SCOTUS on Thursday.

The case, known as Guedes v. BATFE, was last heard by the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, which upheld the ATF rule last year. In its opinion, the appellate court ruled that it was within the ATF’s purview to define bump stocks as machine guns, despite the fact that the devices have no moving parts nor allow for multiple rounds to be fired with a single pull of the trigger.

Other appellate courts, including the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, have disagreed; ruling that the administratively-imposed ban went beyond the agency’s authority.

A plain reading of the statutory language, paired with close consideration of the mechanics of a semi-automatic firearm, reveals that a bump stock is excluded from the technical definition of “machinegun” set forth in the Gun Control Act and National Firearms Act.

But even if that conclusion were incorrect, the rule of lenity would still require us to interpret the statute against imposing criminal liability. A rich legal tradition supports the “well known rule” that “penal laws are to be construed strictly.” United States v. Wiltberger, 18 U.S. (5 Wheat.) 76, 94–95 (1820). As Chief Justice Marshall explained long ago, the rule “is founded on the tenderness of the law for the rights of individuals; and on the plain principle that the power of punishment is vested in the legislative, not in the judicial department. It is the legislature, not the Court, which is to define a crime, and ordain its punishment.” Id. at 95.

The Government’s regulation violates these principles. As an initial matter, it purports to allow ATF—rather than Congress—to set forth the scope of criminal prohibitions. Indeed, the Government would outlaw bump stocks by administrative fiat even though the very same agency routinely interpreted the ban on machineguns as not applying to the type of bump stocks at issue here. Nor can we say that the statutory definition unambiguously supports the Government’s interpretation. As noted above, we conclude that it unambiguously does not. But even if we are wrong, the statute is at least ambiguous in this regard. And if the statute is ambiguous, Congress must cure that ambiguity, not the federal courts.

The definition of “machinegun” as set forth in the National Firearms Act and Gun Control Act does not apply to bump stocks. And if there were any doubt as to this conclusion, we conclude that the statutory definition is ambiguous, at the very least. The rule of lenity therefore compels us to construe the statute in Cargill’s favor. Either way, we must REVERSE.

The Tenth Circuit has sided with the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decision, while the Sixth Circuit found that the rule is unenforceable and setting up a genuine split among the appellate courts. That increases the odds of the Supreme Court accepting Guedes for review, and the division between the lower courts was noted in FPC’s request for the Court to step in.

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PRESIDENT BIDEN’S FANTASY GUN CONTROL AGENDA

Where the Answers are Made Up and the Second Amendment Doesn’t Matter

1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, we have a problem. The President is on the loose again, uttering nonsense about the Second Amendment.

President Joe Biden spoke to a collection of political donors as he’s gearing up his 2024 re-election campaign and used his gun control grindstone to churn out well-worn and discredited Second Amendment tropes. The problem is – it’s all malarky. No kidding, man.

President Joe Biden might just be the lying dog-face pony soldier he accuses others of being.

F-16s and AR-15s
The president belittled Americans who agree that the Second Amendment exists to prevent a tyrannical government from usurping power from the people.

“You know, I love these guys who say the Second Amendment is — you know, the tree of liberty is water with the blood of patriots. Well, if [you] want to do that, you want to work against the government, you need an F-16. You need something else than just an AR-15,” said President Biden according to Fox News.

Aside from the veiled threat to use actual weapons of war against the American people, President Biden’s swipe at Americans who value their rights was intended to target the lawful ownership of Modern Sporting Rifles (MSRs). There are over 24.4 million MSRs in circulation today. They’re the most popular-selling centerfire rifle in America.

Second Amendment Second Thoughts
“We have to change,” President Biden said. “There’s a lot of things we can change, because the American people by and large agree you don’t need a weapon of war. I’m a Second Amendment guy. I taught it for four years, six years in law school. And guess what? It doesn’t say that you can own any weapon you want. It says there are certain weapons that you just can’t own. Even during when it was passed, you couldn’t own a cannon. You can’t own a machine gun.… No, I’m serious.”

First, he’s overselling his authority as a law professor. President Biden briefly served as Benjamin Franklin Presidential Professor of the Practice at the University of Pennsylvania for two years between his terms as vice president and his campaign for The White House, according to a fact check by the Austin American-Statesman. He was paid $900,000 and his duties “involved no regular classes and around a dozen public appearances on campus, mostly in big, ticketed events,” the Philadelphia Inquirer reported.

His description as a “Second Amendment guy” might come as a surprise to other “Second Amendment guys.” That doesn’t normally include ideas like universal background checks that would require a national firearm owner registry, restrictions that would ban entire classes of firearms, repealing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) to allow frivolous lawsuits against firearm manufacturers for the criminal misuse of lawfully sold firearms by remote third parties or – as the president points out here – a clear ignorance of the National Firearms Act.

Fox News reported, correctly, that the Second Amendment makes no mention of firearm restrictions. Gun control laws at the federal level didn’t start until 1934 when the National Firearms Act was signed by President Franklin Roosevelt. That’s 143 years later.

Americans can legally own machine guns, although it is extremely restricted. No automatic firearm produced after May 1986 is available for commercial sale but those produced before then can be – and are – legally owned. Owners have to pay a $200 tax stamp and register them with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF).

When it comes to cannons, well, President Biden blasted that one too. It was legal to own a cannon when the Second Amendment was ratified in 1791. It’s still legal to own one today.

President Biden made the same erroneous claim in April 2022 and in June of 2021, when The Washington Post fact checked him on that one. He earned “Four Pinocchios,” writing “Biden has already been fact-checked on this claim — and it’s been deemed false. We have no idea where he conjured up this notion about a ban on cannon ownership in the early days of the Republic, but he needs to stop making this claim.”

Rapid-Fire Falsehoods
None of this is new. President Biden, who claims to own two shotguns, is hardly the Second Amendment expert he presents himself to be. He once told his wife she should “fire two blasts” of a shotgun blindly into the air if she felt threatened. That’s terrible and dangerous legal advice. Among the four fundamental firearm safety rules is to know your target and what is beyond.

This advice was actually invoked in a court case, where the accused, Jeffrey Barton, was charged with aggravated assault. Prosecutors ended up dropping those charges and instead charged him with police obstruction, of which he was convicted.

President Biden once argued to ban 9 mm Glocks, claiming in an interview with Charlie Rose that he could kill more people with a .38-caliber revolver. He also oddly told police they should shoot “unarmed” attacking criminals wielding knives “in the leg.” Police ripped that suggestion. Fox News reported the Fraternal Order of Police said it was “completely ridiculous,” “unrealistic” and a “pandering talking point.”

President Biden didn’t stop there. He believes that 9 mm handguns are especially dangerous.

“A 9 mm bullet blows the lung out of the body,” President Biden said. “The idea of a high caliber weapon, there is simply no rational basis for it in terms of self-protection, hunting.”

The president’s 9 mm claim was debunked as “bullsh*t,” by a federal agent with 15 years of service. Another with 20 years said, “Not possible.” A 21-year veteran of the U.S. Marshal fugitive recovery task force told Breitbart that President Biden’s claim is, “… not even in the realm of possibility.”

That’s the problem with President Biden. He’s living in a fantasy world of utter nonsense.

Analysis: What the Pistol-Brace Ban Repeal Defeat Means

The Senate voted against undoing President Joe Biden’s pistol-brace ban. That probably won’t have a direct practical impact on the ban’s fate, but it will have a political and, potentially, even a legal one.

On Thursday, the Senate voted 50 to 49 against a resolution to repeal the ATF’s brace rule. The vote was entirely along party lines. Not a single Democrat or Republican crossed over in either direction.

Now, it might not seem like a Senate controlled by the party of the President that instituted the policy refusing to undo it isn’t that unexpected. But there are a couple of reasons this move was surprising.

For starters, this resolution isn’t a standard piece of legislation. If it were, Senate Democrats could have kept it from getting a vote at all or added a bunch of amendments to it. But, since this was a Congressional Review Act (CRA) resolution, it was privileged and got an up or down vote instead.

CRA resolutions have been the primary way Republicans have scored political points against President Biden via legislation since they retook the House in 2022. They’ve managed to push five different resolutions through the House and garner enough Democratic support in the Senate to send them to Biden’s desk. The President has managed to kill all the resolutions by vetoing them, which would require a two-thirds vote of both houses to overcome.

Still, those previous five resolutions pitted Biden and his administration against at least a few Democrats in both houses. The same can’t be said of the pistol-brace ban resolution. While two Democrats in the House voted for it, every Democrat in the Senate rallied to the President’s side.

That may cause political pain for some members who are up for reelection in red or purple states. The rule change effectively bans millions of pistol-brace-equipped firearms, many of which were likely bought years ago, since the vast majority of affected guns have not been registered. So, getting vulnerable Democrats on record supporting it could have some electoral value.

But, as it stands now, the repeal failure is a clear political loss. Instead of making President Biden and Democrats appear divided, it does the exact opposite.

It’s also a potential setback for the legal case against the pistol-brace ban. At the very least, it’s the less ideal outcome because Congress’s opinion of the ATF’s rule is particularly relevant to the challenges.

The key questions at the center of most brace ban lawsuits are not about the Second Amendment. Instead, they’re about the ATF’s power to regulate braced guns and the public’s ability to understand the regulations they hand down. Had Congress been united in passing a resolution declaring the ATF is wrong in how it has reclassified braced guns, that it had overstepped the power granted to it by Congress, that would have provided more ammunition to the groups challenging the legality of the rule on those very grounds.

Instead, Congress is divided on that question. Plaintiffs in the case can point to that division as evidence the ATF doesn’t have clear authority to enact its rule, but the argument is weaker than it otherwise would have been.

Still, that doesn’t mean the pistol-brace ban is going to survive. The cases against it were going well before the repeal resolution passed the House, and the repeal effort losing a 50-49 vote in the Senate is unlikely to sink its legal prospects.

Four federal courts have already issued injections blocking the ATF from enforcing the rule against millions of Americans. A Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals panel got the ball rolling just before the ATF’s grace period for registering the affected guns ended at the beginning of the month by protecting Firearms Policy Coalition members from arrest and prosecution as it prepared to hear the case on the merits. A second court in the same circuit followed up by blocking enforcement against Second Amendment Foundation members. A third extended an injunction to all Gun Owners of America members. The National Rifle Association, which has a separate case in the Eighth Circuit, has asked for a Fifth Circuit judge to extend protections to its members.

The number of people protected under those injections has already grown since they were handed down. The affected gun-rights groups have seen their membership numbers rise, with the Second Amendment Foundation claiming 20,000 new members in the first week after it got its injunction.

A ruling on the merits of the case will probably still come soon. To issue a preliminary injunction against the rule, the Fifth Circuit panel had to conclude that the ban was likely unconstitutional. The Senate’s repeal rejection probably won’t force them to reconsider that conclusion as they begin to hear oral arguments on June 29th. And, as much as it doesn’t help things, the safe money is still on the panel striking the rule down.

Legal action still is, and always was, the most viable path for gun-rights advocates to bring down the brace ban. But the failure to get the repeal resolution through the Senate, even if it would have been doomed by a veto anyway, represents a notable setback nonetheless.

Press Release: Attorney General Bailey joins 23 states in opposing California’s defacto handgun ban

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. – Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey announced today that his office joined 23 other states in challenging California’s “Unsafe Handgun Act.” The amicus brief supports the California Rifle & Pistol Association’s challenge to the California law aimed at limiting the sale and use of guns in California and nationwide.“The Second Amendment guarantees freedom and security for all Americans. I will not stand idly by while rogue progressive activists in California attempt to eradicate the freedoms of law-abiding gun owners that are enshrined in our Constitution,” said Attorney General Bailey. “I am proud to stand in the gap with my fellow attorneys general to protect our God-given rights.”The State of California aims to use the “Unsafe Handgun Act” to chill firearm commerce. California law requires new semiautomatic handguns to have three components:

  1. A chamber load indicator,
  2. a magazine disconnect mechanism, and
  3. microstamping capability.

Currently, no new gun on the market meets all three of these requirements. California has effectively created hurdles to halt the purchase of all new firearms, a clear violation of the Second Amendment.Joining Missouri in filing the brief are the states of Alabama, Alaska, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, and Wyoming.

Well, it’s SloJoe. We shouldn’t expect him to make sense

Biden’s Latest Anti-Gun Claims Aren’t Just False — They Don’t Even Make Sense

Biden’s most recent anti-gun claims during the National Safer Communities Summit are false, incomplete, and incoherent.

Biden’s gun control speech on Friday at the National Safer Communities Summit in Connecticut got attention because the president nonsensically concluded with “God save the Queen, man.” However, this was not his only incoherent claim.

In his speech, Biden stated: “Put a pistol on a brace, and it ma- — turns into a gun. Makes them where you can have a higher-caliber weapon — a higher-caliber bullet coming out of that gun. It’s essentially turning it into a short-barreled rifle, which has been a weapon of choice by a number of mass shooters.”

Of course, a “stabilizing brace” doesn’t turn a pistol into a gun. A pistol already is a gun.

What’s more, stabilizing braces have only been used in two mass public shootings (Dayton, Ohio, in 2019 and Boulder, Colorado, in 2021), but there is no evidence that the braces even made any difference in these attacks.

Even so, few realize that stabilizing braces were originally designed to allow veterans with hand disabilities to hold handguns, not for mass shooters to commit a crime more effectively. The braces are straps that allow the disabled person to keep hold of the gun when it recoils. Without a gun and a steady aim, disabled people are very vulnerable to criminals. But Biden will never mention that.

Even when pistol braces are used among law-abiding gun owners who are not disabled, their personal efforts to ensure steadier aim are not inherently negative or dangerous.

If Biden is worried about the dangerous potential of more powerful guns with less recoil, he should also address the various ways they can be obtained apart from stabilizing braces. For example, rifles are powerful weapons — 70 out of 82 bullets used in rifles are ranked as more powerful than a .223. If a criminal wants reduced recoil, he can simply use a rifle — heavier guns dampen the recoil, and rifles weigh more.

What’s more, in guns with short barrels, such as pistols, the bullet leaves the barrel before full pressure is developed and travels at a lower velocity. However, if an attacker wants a more powerful and more compact gun, there are alternatives to handguns. He can easily saw off part of the barrel of the rifle. After all, when facing multiple life sentences for murder, an additional penalty for sawing off the end of a rifle won’t make much difference.

But even Biden’s claim that short-barrel rifles are the weapon of choice for these mass murderers is also ridiculous. Again, only two of the roughly 100 mass public shooters over the last 25 years involved handguns with pistol braces. In 56.4 percent of mass shootings, only handguns were used (no braces), in 14.9 percent, rifles were used, and in 16 percent of attacks, rifles and another type of gun were used.

Finally, there is Biden’s screaming claim that “We are sending dangerous weapons, particularly assault weapons, to Mexico.” Mexico’s president does indeed blame America for his country’s high murder rate — in some recent years, it has been six times higher than the rate in the U.S.

According to data from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), close to 70 percent of all criminally-owned guns in Mexico traced from 2009-2014 came from the U.S. A significant number of these were purchased legally in southwest states before being criminally smuggled over the border.

However, these figures are based only on the limited number of guns that Mexican authorities have seized, traced, and submitted to the agency for checking. For instance, Mexico submitted 11,000 guns to the ATF in 2007-08, though it seized 29,000. Of those, they successfully traced 6,000, and 5,114 (or 85 percent) of those traceable weapons came from the U.S. Thus, only about 17.6 percent of the firearms that Mexico collected were traced back to the U.S. That’s a small subset.

More recent data from the ATF for 2016 to 2021 even shows that the 70 percent has declined to around 50 percent, but we don’t have the rest of the breakdown in the numbers for this later period. And a 2016 U.S. Government Accountability Office report complained of limited collaboration with Mexican authorities on tracing guns.

And what about the fully automatic guns and grenades used to commit murders in Mexico? You can’t just go into gun stores in the U.S. and buy these types of weapons. However, between 2005 and 2014, the Mexican government seized more than 13,000 grenades.

“These kinds of guns — the auto versions of these guns — they are not coming from El Paso,” Ed Head, an Arizona firearms instructor with over two decades of experience as a U.S. Border Patrol agent told Fox News. “They are coming from other sources. They are brought in from Guatemala. They are brought in from places like China. They are being diverted from the military. But you don’t get these guns from the U.S.”

Similarly, as an anonymous Tijuana-based police authority told Fox News, “Most cartels buy in bulk, and the weapons are coming from places like Nicaragua and other South American countries. Also Asia and some from the Middle East.”

Machine guns, grenades, and other weapons are also stolen from the Mexican military before being sold to these cartels.

Unfortunately, the news media and their “fact-checkers” are prone to ignore Biden’s false gun claims from misstating how guns work to the source of Mexico’s violent crime problem. Sure, once in a while they acknowledge how he lied about a U.S. cannon ban at the country’s founding. But they refuse to address his lies and how they are unjustly shaping today’s public opinion surrounding gun ownership.

FPC Completes Appellate Injunction Briefing in Lawsuit Challenging ATF Pistol Brace Rule

NEW ORLEANS, LA (June 21, 2023) – Today, Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) announced the filing of a reply brief with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in Mock v. Garland, FPC and FPC Action Foundation’s challenge to ATF’s pistol brace rule. The brief was filed less than one month after the Court clarified that its injunction against the rule covers FPC’s members. The brief, which was the final filling in the case before oral argument, can be viewed at FPCLegal.org.

“Nothing in Appellees’ rehashed arguments alters the conclusion already reached by the motions panel,” argues the brief. “Appellants remain likely to win on the merits because a braced pistol is a constitutionally protected bearable arm, and the Agencies have not met their burden of showing that the right to keep and bear arms historically allowed NFA-like regulation of braced pistols or SBRs, however defined.”

Plaintiffs are requesting that the Fifth Circuit issue a preliminary injunction to preserve the status quo while they argue their full case–functionally extending the injunction beyond just the length of the appeal. The case is set for argument before the Fifth Circuit on June 29th.

FPC and FPCAF have specifically requested an injunction that will extend to all individuals, not just Plaintiffs and their members and customers: “The public has no interest in the unlawful enforcement of [ATF’s] rule and the irreparable harms that accompany it. This Court should thus reverse the district court and enter a nationwide preliminary injunction to prevent these harms.”

“All we’re asking is for the Fifth Circuit to ensure that peaceable people across the United States are protected from ATF’s enforcement of its unlawful and unconstitutional pistol brace rule for the length of the case,” said Cody J. Wisniewski, FPCAF’s Senior Attorney for Constitutional Litigation and FPC’s counsel in this case. “The firearms at issue here have been properly treated as pistols for a decade; we simply want to preserve that status quo while we make our full case to the Court.”