The Biden administration and Democrats faced significant setbacks at the Supreme Court and federal courts on Friday after a series of rulings declared crucial gun control measures as unconstitutional.
The Supreme Court just “struck down a federal rule put in place during former President Donald Trump’s administration that prohibited bump stocks for guns, handing a major victory to Second Amendment advocates,” Just the News reported. The court, in a 6-3 ruling, determined that the attachments used to increase the firing rate of semiautomatic weapons do not transform them into illegal machine guns.
“This case asks whether a bump stock—an accessory for a semi-automatic rifle that allows the shooter to rapidly reengage the trigger (and therefore achieve a high rate of fire)—converts the rifle into a ‘machinegun.’ We hold that it does not,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in the majority opinion.
In the aftermath of a tragic mass shooting at a country music festival in Las Vegas in 2017, where over 50 individuals lost their lives and more than 500 were injured, a ban was enforced. The perpetrator carried out the attack by firing upon the crowd from a room in the nearby MGM Grand hotel. However, the justices have now determined that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives exceeded its authority when implementing this ban. On the other hand, the Biden administration contended that the ban was within the bounds of the law.
Simultaneously, the Biden administration faced a significant setback in their pursuit of an “assault weapons ban.” A federal court in Texas ruled in a separate case that the ATF’s endeavor to regulate and tax “pistol braces” was deemed “unlawful” and “illegitimate.”
“In a 12-page decision, the Texas-based U.S. District Court vacated the rule that could have led to the destruction of millions of firearms, among the most popular in America, and the jailing of owners who had refused to comply with the administration,” the Washington Examiner reported.
“ATF broke the law by being overreaching sneaky pricks. Therefore, the right thing for the Court to do was throw the Rule in the trash. The Court threw the Pistol Brace Rule in the trash,” the Firearms Policy Coalition announced.
The Examiner added:
“For years, ATF gave its blessing that putting the adjustable braces on pistols was allowed even though the braces could be used as a style of stock, turning the firearms into short-barreled rifles. Typically, short barreled rifles are regulated under the Al Capone era National Firearms Act which requires a $200 tax stamp and registration. In his decision, Judge Reed O’Connor said that the ATF was wrong in just changing its mind without giving an explanation. He also hit the agency for ignoring comments from users and writing the rule vaguely.”
“The court finds that the adaptation of the final rule was arbitrary and capricious for two reasons. First, the defendants did not provide a detailed justification for their reversal of the agency’s longstanding position. And second, the final rule’s standards are impermissibly vague,” O’Connor wrote.
The Examiner reported that there are approximately 10 million such weapons in the United States. However, during the grace period established by the ATF, less than 300,000 owners registered their weapons without paying the $200 tax. In addition, Scripps News Service reported that a federal court overturned Biden’s “gun show loophole” in four states, deeming it “invalid.” U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk stated that the Biden administration’s rule, which requires background checks for most firearms sold at gun shows, cannot be enforced in these four states.
Previously, a federal judge ruled that the three states lacked standing to sue over the rule. However, Judge Kacsmaryk, who was appointed by Trump and presides over a court in Northern Texas, disagreed. He argued that the states demonstrated they would lose tax revenue due to the rule and believed their court action would likely succeed as the rule violates the Administrative Procedure Act.
“These new rules clearly violate the Second Amendment. The Biden administration continues to recklessly attack our constitutional rights. Louisiana will challenge them every step of the way,” said Louisiana Attorney General Liz Murrill.
