Observers watched the justices in U.S. v. Rahimi closely as it is the first major Second Amendment decision handed down since the monumental Bruen case in 2022.
Chief Justice John Roberts authored the 8-1 majority opinion. He wrote, “We conclude only this: An individual found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment.”
Many believe this decision may impact several other cases and legislative acts that are currently being contested.
Some pundits further assert that the Rahimi decision signaled that many gun control laws may withstand the parameters emphatically established by the Supreme Court in the Bruen case. According to CNN, Roberts revealed that he and most of his fellow justices had “no trouble” reaching the court’s conclusion.
Roberts further explained the determination of the majority. “When a restraining order contains a finding that an individual poses a credible threat to the physical safety of an intimate partner, the individual may — consistent with the Second Amendment — be banned from possessing firearms while the order is in effect.”
The Chief Justice added that since the country’s founding, laws have been in place to protect individuals from those who would use a weapon to harm them. “As applied to the facts of this case, [the statute] fits comfortably within this tradition.”
It found an almost unanimous consensus among justices in agreeing that U.S. law has enough historical precedent for disarming those deemed dangerous to society. Justice Clarence Thomas disagreed in his lone dissent.
Bruen established the test of determining whether a current law or regulation is rooted in the nation’s history and tradition of gun restrictions. Though this application was hotly contested before the ruling, the high court found enough historical evidence of lawmakers prohibiting weapons possession by those deemed a risk.
The specific case that reached the highest court in the land concerned Zackey Rahimi, a Texas resident who argued that he still had the right to keep a weapon for self-defense despite being under a DVRO. He was charged five years ago with physically attacking his ex-girlfriend and then another female while possessing a weapon.
A Texas court granted his ex-girlfriend a DVRO after determining Rahimi “committed family violence.” This act nullified the defendant’s license to carry a firearm, and he was cautioned that possessing a gun while subject to this order would constitute a federal crime.
Rahimi apparently did not heed this warning. He was further accused of confronting and threatening his former romantic partner and of firing a weapon in public in five instances over the course of a few weeks.
Investigators searched his home and uncovered a rifle, handgun and ammunition.
The defendant pleaded guilty to federal charges of possessing a firearm while subject to a DVRO, but then he appealed.
His case initially succeeded when the 5th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals determined that Rahimi’s constitutional rights under the Bruen decision were infringed upon. The panel concluded that the historical precedent necessary for the current gun control law did not exist.
That decision is now swept aside by an overwhelming court majority, though several justices appeared to have misgivings about its scope. This is reflected in the filing of six concurrences with the ruling by jurists on both sides of the ideological spectrum.
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