After a tumultuous term that culminated in divisive decisions ending affirmative action in higher education and allowing businesses to deny service on the basis of personal beliefs, the Supreme Court announced this week the cases they will take up in October.
One case, which will consider whether a person can possess a gun while under a domestic violence restraining order, is expected to draw similar controversy.
The case centers on a 1994 amendment to the Federal Firearms Act that bans such individuals from having guns and an Arlington, Texas, man named Zackey Rahimi who was subject to a protective order in 2020 after he assaulted his ex-girlfriend and later pleaded guilty to possessing guns.
Rahimi and his girlfriend had an argument in 2019, according to federal prosecutors, and he knocked her to the ground and dragged her to his car, banging her head. He then shot at a bystander who witnessed the assault and later threatened to shoot his girlfriend if she told anyone, according to court documents
Between December 2020 and January 2021, Rahimi was involved in five shootings and pleaded guilty to violating the firearms act, admitting he owned the guns and he was under a protective order. But earlier this year an appeals court undid Rahimi’s conviction, ruling it was unconstitutional because of the Second Amendment.
“The question presented in this case is not whether prohibiting the possession of firearms by someone subject to a domestic violence restraining order is a laudable policy goal. The question is whether… a specific statute that does so, is constitutional under the Second Amendment of the United States Constitution,” three judges on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit wrote in their ruling. “It is not.”
The three judges — two appointed by former President Donald Trump and the third by President Ronald Reagan — based their ruling on a 2022 Supreme Court decision that concluded the right to carry a concealed pistol in public was a constitutional right and regulations needed to be in line with the United States’ “historical tradition of firearm regulation.”
The Biden administration is arguing the domestic violence statute is in line with the country’s history of gun laws.
“More than a million acts of domestic violence occur in the United States every year, and the presence of a firearm increases the chance that violence will escalate to homicide,” Biden administration lawyers wrote in their petition to get the Supreme Court to consider their appeal, before quoting a 2014 Supreme Court ruling written by liberal Justice Sonia Sotomayor: “All too often… the only difference between a battered woman and a dead woman is the presence of a gun.”
The Biden administration attorneys also quoted Justices Samuel Alito and Brett Kavanaugh, both conservative justices, from their writings in the 2022 case to bolster their case. Alito wrote the decision “decides nothing about who may lawfully possess a firearm or the requirements that must be met to buy a gun” and Kavanagh wrote that the Second Amendment “allows a ‘variety’ of gun regulations.”
“This Court should grant the petition… to clarify that, contrary to the Fifth Circuit’s view, the Second Amendment allows the government to disarm dangerous individuals, including those subject to domestic-violence restraining orders,” the government lawyers wrote.
Democrats and gun control advocacy organizations were quick to express concern over the Supreme Court taking up the case.
“Next up on the Supreme Court’s list of priorities? Dismantling the right of a governor to protect her state’s most vulnerable residents & survivors of domestic abuse from gun violence,” New York Gov. Kathy Hochul wrote on Twitter. “New York State will be ready to fight back.”
Wisconsin Rep. Mark Pocan tweeted “I have little faith this is going to end well.”
And California Sen. Dianne Feinstein wrote “if the Supreme Court strikes down this law, more women will be killed. It’s that simple,” citing a statistic used by advocates based on a 2003 study that concluded women were roughly five times more likely to be killed if their domestic abuser had access to a gun.
Everytown for Gun Safety, an organization funded almost entirely by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, examined federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data from 2019 and concluded an average of 70 women a month are shot and killed by an intimate partner.
The Supreme Court also announced Friday they would review six other cases in October, including ones that touch on workplace discrimination, double jeopardy laws, immigration cases, and the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s enforcement authority.