A few misguided malaprops over the winter by a few administration officials speaking off-script about guns, gun laws, and the intersection of gun rights and free speech, piled on top of Trump's executive orders on "bump stocks" during his first term, caused some vocal Libertarians and gun rights supporters to claim "the GOP is the real gun grabber party".
If you actually pay attention to the issue, you might think pointing them at real-life Democrat policies in Colorado and Virginia, and proposals in Minnesota, among other places, would get them to think for a moment.
If that doesn't work? The Department of Justice on Trump's watch appears to have not only repented of its errors, but has become the first Justice Department ever to tangibly support the Second Amendment.
The DOJ is currently pursuing five lawsuits against state policies that infringe on the amendment.
Over the winter, the DOJ filed suit against the District of Columbia's passive-aggressive peekaboo ban on "modern sporting rifles," including the AR15:
Under DC law, all gun owners must register their weapons with local police. The nation's capital, though, bars the registration of AR-15 and other fast-loading guns, which effectively blocks people from legally owning them.
The "ban on some of America's most popular firearms is an unconstitutional infringement on the Second Amendment," US Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a statement, referring to the right to bear arms.
You have to register all guns in DC (provided you're not a criminal); the police refuse to accept resitrations for AR15s and other such weapons, which would seem to fly in the face of the Supreme Court's 2022 Bruen ruling that the Second Amendment protects "commonly used" firearms - and with over 30 million in ciriculation, there is no more commonly used firearm of any kind in the US today - and saying "I don't wanna register them" isn't going to fly in court.
The suit is making the Brady mob angry...
“I was working in the Chamber of the U.S. House of Representatives at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. It terrifies me to imagine another January 6 – but this time with insurrectionists openly and legally carrying AR-15s. What an abuse of the storied history of DOJ's Civil Rights Division, which was created to protect communities of color from discrimination – not to increase violence and gun industry profits.
...which is a good start by any measure.
In slightly older but still good news, the DOJ is suing the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department (LASD) over its habit of slow-walking carry permit paperwork; while permits in most states that require them take days to weeks, Los Angeles County issues permits, roughly, when we find out who Corn Pop really was.
Again - the DOJ is working to remove "malicious compliance" from the options available to local authorities:
In the filing, the DOJ argued that LASD has “has systematically denied thousands of law-abiding Californians their fundamental Second Amendment right to bear arms outside the home — not through outright refusal, but through a deliberate pattern of unconscionable delay that renders this constitutional right meaningless in practice.”
In a statement, LASD said it “respects the Second Amendment” and remains “committed to addressing all applications fairly, promptly, and with a balanced approach.”
The LASD is claiming, rightly or tactically, that they inherited the problem:
In the statement, LASD said that since taking office in December 2022, “the Sheriff has inherited a dysfunctional system that was not funded for staffing” but has since taken steps to reduce the backlog from about 10,000 applications to roughly 3,200, noting that the department has only 13 personnel to process applications. It attributed the delays cited by the DOJ in part to a transition from a paper-based system to an online platform that was ongoing at the time of the DOJ’s investigation, noting that LASD has approved more than 19,000 applications since 2020 — including more than 5,000 this year.
As some LASD deputy has no doubt told some suspect, somewhere, sometime, "tell it to the judge".
In terms of passive-aggression, it'd be hard to beat the policy in force in the US Virgin Islands:
The lawsuit, filed by the Civil Rights Division, alleges that the police department dragged its feet in approving gun permit applications, and also imposed "unreasonable" conditions before issuing licenses such as requiring people to install bolted-in gun safes.
And so off to court they shall go. Bolt that to your wall.
And finally - so far - in Colorado, not one but two lawsuits.
As noted in this space earlier this month, the DOJ is taking on Denver over its "assault weapon" ban. They'll be defending that against Harmeet Dhillon's new focus on gun rights:
Enacted nearly 40 years ago, the Denver ordinance restricts firearms with magazines over 15 rounds, including any weapons that have been modified to do so. The civil lawsuit filed Tuesday asks a judge to stop the city and its police department from enforcing the weapons ban and to implement policies that “correct” instances in which people’s rights were violated.
“Law-abiding Americans, regardless of what city or state they reside in, should not have to live under threat of criminal sanction just for exercising their Second Amendment right to possess arms which are owned by tens of millions of their fellow citizens,” Harmeet Dhillon, the head of the department’s Civil Rights Division, said in a statement.
Beyond that? Colorado's ban on magazines over 15 rounds - which accounts for something like 80% of the magazines sold and circulated in America today - also got a summons:
“Colorado’s ban on certain magazines is political virtue signaling at the expense of Americans’ constitutional right to keep and bear arms,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who leads the Civil Rights Division, said in a statement. “Under my direction, the Division’s Second Amendment Section will continue to defend law-abiding Americans’ rights against unconstitutional restrictions on their right to possess arms which are owned by tens of millions of their fellow citizens.”
Of course, the goal is not just to strike down the policies: the goal is to set precedents in case law in the Federal court system, and (if one of the cities, states, or territories wants to fight the decisions) the Supreme Court, governing the ability of cities and states to infringe on the right to self-defense.
Which is of particular interest, among many other people, to me.
