Latest news with #AR15
Wall Street Journal
2 days ago
- General
- Wall Street Journal
Four Justices for AR-15s . . . Next Time
Is the AR-15 rifle protected by the Second Amendment? The Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals last year said no in a doubtful opinion written by the redoubtable conservative Judge J. Harvie Wilkinson III. On Monday the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal of that ruling, while sending an unmistakable message to Second Amendment advocates: Ask again later. The oddity is that it takes four Justices to accept a case, and four chose to go on record here. Justices Samuel Alito and Neil Gorsuch stated that they would have heard the Fourth Circuit appeal, Snope v. Brown. Justice Clarence Thomas wrote a longer dissent from the denial. 'The State of Maryland prohibits ownership of AR-15s, the most popular civilian rifle in America,' he begins. Then he casts shade on the Fourth Circuit's 'surprising conclusion' that 'AR-15s are not 'arms' protected by the Second Amendment.' That's three Justices. The fourth is Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who issued a 'statement' tipping his hand. AR-15s are legal in 41 states, he says, and Americans own 20 million to 30 million of them. The Snope petitioners therefore 'have a strong argument that AR-15s are in 'common use' by law-abiding citizens and therefore are protected by the Second Amendment.' He calls the Fourth Circuit's contrary ruling 'questionable.'
New York Times
2 days ago
- General
- New York Times
Supreme Court Turns Down Challenge to Ban on Semiautomatic Rifles
The Supreme Court announced on Monday that it would not hear a major Second Amendment challenge to a Maryland law banning semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15. As is the court's practice, its brief order gave no reasons. The move, over the objections of three conservative justices, let the ban stand and reflected the court's intermittent engagement with gun rights. It has issued only three significant Second Amendment decisions since recognizing an individual right to own guns in 2008. The Maryland law was enacted in 2013 in response to the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut the previous year. It banned many semiautomatic rifles and imposed a 10-round limit on gun magazines. In dissent, Justice Clarence Thomas said the court should have considered the question, which the justices have repeatedly declined to resolve. 'I would not wait to decide whether the government can ban the most popular rifle in America,' he wrote. 'That question is of critical importance to tens of millions of law-abiding AR-15 owners throughout the country. We have avoided deciding it for a full decade.' He added that the court's commitment to the Second Amendment was inadequate. 'I doubt we would sit idly by if lower courts were to so subvert our precedents involving any other constitutional right,' he wrote. 'Until we are vigilant in enforcing it, the right to bear arms will remain 'a second-class right.'' Want all of The Times? Subscribe.
Washington Post
2 days ago
- General
- Washington Post
Supreme Court won't hear challenge to Maryland assault weapons ban
WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court declined on Monday to hear a challenge to a state ban on assault weapons, semiautomatic rifles that are popular among gun owners and have also been used in multiple mass shootings. The justices turned down a case against a Maryland law passed after the 2012 shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut that killed 20 children and six adults. The shooter was armed with an AR-15 , one of the firearms commonly referred to as an assault weapon.
Reuters
2 days ago
- General
- Reuters
US Supreme Court won't review assault weapon, high-capacity magazine bans
June 2 (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court declined on Monday to hear a challenge to the legality of state restrictions on assault-style rifles and large-capacity ammunition magazines, passing up cases that offered the justices a chance to further expand gun rights. The justices turned away two appeals after lower courts upheld a ban in Maryland on powerful semi-automatic rifles such as AR-15s and one in Rhode Island restricting the possession of ammunition feeding devices holding more than 10 rounds. The lower courts rejected arguments that the measures violate the U.S. Constitution's Second Amendment right to "keep and bear arms." In a nation bitterly divided over how to address firearms violence including numerous mass shootings, the Supreme Court, which has a 6-3 conservative majority, often has taken an expansive view of the Second Amendment. The court broadened gun rights in landmark rulings in 2008, 2010 and in a 2022 case that made it harder to defend gun restrictions under the Second Amendment, requiring them to be "consistent with the nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation." The challengers now before the Supreme Court contended that states and courts are flouting precedents that make clear that the Second Amendment protects weapons that are in "common use." Maryland in 2013 enacted its ban on military-style "assault weapons" such as the semiautomatic AR-15 and AK-47 after a shooter used such a firearm in the 2012 mass killing of 20 children and six adults at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut. The law carries a penalty of up to three years in prison. A Maryland resident who is seeking to purchase one of the banned guns, as well as three gun rights organizations including the Firearms Policy Coalition, sued in 2020, claiming the ban violates the Second Amendment. The Richmond, Virginia-based 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in 2024 rejected the challenge because it said assault weapons "are military-style weapons designed for sustained combat operations that are ill-suited and disproportionate to the need for self-defense." As such, the "excessively dangerous" firearms are not protected by the Second Amendment, the 4th Circuit decided. The 4th Circuit said it refused "to wield the Constitution to declare that military-style armaments which have become primary instruments of mass killing and terrorist attacks in the United States are beyond the reach of our nation's democratic processes." The plaintiffs told the Supreme Court that the term "assault weapon" is a political term that is designed to exploit public confusion over machine guns and semi-automatic firearms. The banned weapons, they said, are "identical to any other semiautomatic firearm - arms that are exceedingly common and fully protected by the Second Amendment." Rhode Island's law, passed in 2022 as a response to mass shootings, bars most "large-capacity feeding" devices such as a magazine or drum that can hold more than 10 rounds of ammunition. The state calls it a "mild restriction on a particularly dangerous weapons accessory" and that in mass shooting situations, "any pause in fire, such as the pause to switch magazines, allows for precious seconds in which to escape or take defensive action." The law applied retroactively, meaning residents had to surrender or alter any banned magazine that they owned, and carries a penalty of up to five years in prison. Four gun owners and a registered firearms dealer sued, claiming the ban violated their Second Amendment rights, and that having to forfeit the magazines they owned violated the Constitution's prohibition on the government taking property without compensation. In 2024 the Boston-based 1st U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals rejected the claims and refused to block the law, noting that the weapons have been deployed in mass shootings for a reason: "Semiautomatic firearms fitted with (large capacity magazines) are highly effective weapons of mass slaughter." Magazine capacity "directly corresponds to lethality," the 1st Circuit said. The Rhode Island plaintiffs told the Supreme Court that instead of abiding by the Supreme Court's 2022 ruling, the state's law "can only be understood as protest legislation imposing more restrictive bans on long-common arms." The Supreme Court has been buffeted in recent years by challenges to gun restrictions. It is due to rule by the end of June on the legality of a 2022 regulation issued by Democratic former President Joe Biden's administration cracking down on "ghost guns," largely untraceable firearms whose use has proliferated in crimes nationwide. The justices signaled approval of that ban during arguments in the case in October. The court in June 2024 upheld a federal law that makes it a crime for people under domestic violence restraining orders to have guns. They also struck down a federal ban on "bump stock" devices that enable semiautomatic weapons to fire rapidly like machine guns, although that case was not centered on the Second Amendment.
Leader Live
28-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Leader Live
UK band robbed at gunpoint in US say it is still ‘greatest country in the world'
The van was broken into by masked thieves, who pulled out a gun, when they had stopped for coffee at a Starbucks in Vallejo, California, late last year, with the group's singer saying tracks they recorded for their latest album, which was released last week, predicted the robbery. Indie rockers Sports Team, who released their Boys These Days LP last week, had personal items stolen but they did not lose any equipment. Singer Alex Rice told PA: 'It was almost like a pretty wild coincidence. 'We had a track, the album was all written and recorded, submitted well before we did that tour, but we did have this track, Bang Bang Bang on it, which we ended up putting out fairly soon after, which I guess was about this weird juxtaposition you always find in the US. 'It's got lines in it like Mickey Mouse and AR 15 kind of thing, it's side by side, the kind of bars that we were drinking in the US, and people will show you where their friends were shot, the kind of gun holes on the walls. 'So I think we've always found that element of gun culture in the US kind of a slightly odd element, like, I understand it, and when we go there I think America is the greatest country in the world still, but I think it just seems such a blind spot. 'And I think some of the politicisation around it just doesn't do anyone any favours.' The band initially tried to stop the burglars, after a Starbucks worker had noticed their van being broken into, in December 2024, before the gun was pointed at them. Rice said the robbery quickly became 'politicised'. He added: 'The interview requests come in, and we did a nice one with ABC, where it's like you talk about gun crime being awful, and you talk about charities involved and stuff. 'And then immediately you get a request from Fox News as well, who kind of want to politicise it, make it about (California governor) Gavin Newsom defunding the police kind of thing. 'It's how quickly kind of an event can be spun, (which) was quite interesting to us. 'So we were going to do the Fox interview and they were going to send the Fox mobile to this town we were staying in at the time, and they cancelled it as soon as we posted about an anti-gun charity.' Rice said he and the band have yet to hear back from the police, having been asked to fill out an online form when they called 911. He said: 'We haven't heard anything back since at all, I think there was probably a bit of scrutiny on the police department in Vallejo, which I know is a kind of particularly embattled police force. 'I'm sure these aren't people who are not wanting to solve gun crimes, but I think it probably speaks to problems with funding, and the kind of pressures the police force are in, in that part of the world. 'I mean, what would they deal with if they won't deal with an armed robbery, you know?' The band, made up of Rice, Rob Knaggs, Henry Young, Oli Dewdney, Al Greenwood, and Ben Mack, released their debut album, Deep Down Happy, in 2020, which was nominated for the Mercury Prize and went to number two in the UK charts. Their 2022 follow-up, Gulp!, was also well received and rose to number three in the charts. The group, who performed at Glastonbury in 2022, released their third album, Boys These Days, on May 23.
