WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Friday upheld a federal law barring domestic violence victims from owning firearms, reversing a recent endorsement of broad gun rights.
The court ruled 8-1 in favor of the Biden administration, which defended the law — one of several federal gun restrictions currently facing legal challenges.
The decision shows that some long-standing gun laws are likely to survive, despite the court’s 2022 ruling that expanded gun rights by finding for the first time that there is a right to bear arms outside the home under the Second Amendment.
Chief Justice John Roberts, writing for the majority, wrote that since the founding of the United States, “our nation’s firearms laws have contained provisions preventing the misuse of firearms by persons who threaten physical harm to others.”
The provision at issue in the case “fits comfortably within that tradition,” he said.
In reaching its conclusion, the court rejected some of the arguments the Biden administration had advanced in defense of the law, including that the government could disarm “irresponsible” people.
Although the vote swung, with only conservative Justice Clarence Thomas dissenting, the decision exposed divisions among the justices on the gun rights issue, with five justices writing separate concurring opinions explaining their views.
In a case called the 2022 decision New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen, said that gun restrictions should be analyzed based on the historical understanding of the right to bear arms. So decided raised questions Gun rights advocates say many existing gun restrictions are not anchored in historical tradition.
Another law banning illegal drug users from possessing firearms has gained attention in part because President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, has been accused of violating it. constitutional challenge.
The conservative-majority court’s three liberal justices made up the majority, making it clear they disagreed with the 2022 decision.
Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, appointed by President Joe Biden after the ruling, said the new case “highlights the obvious difficulty judges on the ground face” in deciding which gun laws should stand in light of the earlier ruling.
The case before the judges involved Zakki Rahimi of Texas, whose partner obtained a restraining order against him in February 2020. He argued that the Supreme Court ruled that he could not be convicted under the federal gun possession restriction.
Rahimi’s ex-partner, with whom he shares a child, received a restraining order after a 2019 incident in a parking lot in Arlington, Texas. He hit his head on the dashboard, prosecutors said in court documents. It is alleged that he fired his gun at the witness.
Even while the protective order was in effect, Rahimi was involved in a series of shootings, including one in which he allegedly shot a home using an AR-15 rifle, prosecutors allege.
Rahimi faces state charges of domestic violence and a separate assault against another woman. But the case before the justices involves a separate prosecution by the Justice Department for violating federal gun possession laws.
Rahimi eventually pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 6 years in prison.
The 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans applied the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in Rahimi’s case, concluding last year that the law “failed to pass constitutional muster.”