Tanya is taking a much-deserved vacation and the staff at The Gun Mag has taken the liberty of compiling this week’s legislative update, which includes some very restrictive measures.
SAF Lawsuit v. WA AG Can Move Forward
A three-judge panel of the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court has ruled unanimously that the Second Amendment Foundation, Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms and gun rights champion Alan Gottlieb can move forward with their civil rights lawsuit against former Washington state Attorney General, now Governor Bob Ferguson. See report here.
The decision said the district court committed an “abuse of discretion” when it dismissed the lawsuit without allowing the plaintiffs to amend their complaint in response to Ferguson’s motion to dismiss. As noted by the court, “Plaintiffs sought leave to amend the complaint in response to Defendants’ motion to dismiss. The district court dismissed Plaintiffs’ claims without prejudice for lack of subject matter jurisdiction and entered judgment the same day. The order contains no discussion of leave to amend. Under these circumstances, dismissal without prejudice ended the case because the district court allowed no opportunity to amend.
“Because the district court denied leave to amend and failed to explain why it did so,” the decision says a few lines later, “we…hold that the denial of leave to amend here was an abuse of discretion.”
The panel consisted of Circuit Judges Ronald M. Gould and Morgan Christen, and Senior Circuit Judge Richard C. Tallman. Gould and Tallman are Bill Clinton appointees and Christen is a Barack Obama appointee.
Wisconsin Supreme Court decision
In a shocking decision, the Wisconsin Supreme Court rejected a Democratic effort to redraw the state’s federal congressional district lines ahead of the 2026 midterm elections. This legal challenge, led by prominent Democratic lawyers, aimed to alter the current 6-2 Republican-to-Democrat split among Wisconsin’s eight congressional seats. Had the court accepted the challenge, Democrats could have increased their representation to a 4-4 split, potentially flipping two seats and narrowing the Republicans’ slim majority in the U.S. House of Representatives.
SCOTUS 2024-2025 WRAP-UP
The United States Supreme Court ended its 2024-2025 term this past week. Two cases, that are not Second Amendment cases, have been highlighted by Attorney Mark W. Smith on his YouTube channel, The Four Boxes Diner. I will summarize them as I believe, similarly to Smith, that they may be harbingers of the current Supreme Court’s thinking on its willingness to address the inability or unwillingness of lower courts to follow SCOTUS dicta.
Medina v. Planned Parenthood South Atlantic, is a case concerning Medicare payments for abortions. In this case, the litigants sued the State of South Carolina when the state cut off Medicaid funding for Planned Parenthood. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of South Carolina. SCOTUS directly addressed the lower courts’ claim of confusion regarding the application of Supreme Court methodology. Since many lower courts in Second Amendment cases have openly stated that they are confused about how to apply Bruen methodolgy, Smith believes that this decision where the Supreme Court explicitly addressed the lower courts’ claims of confusion, saying if lower courts “lack the guidance they need,” the Supreme Court is willing to step in and clarify the law. Smith interprets this as a warning: if lower courts continue to claim confusion about how to apply Supreme Court precedents, they will clarify when a case gets to them.
Mimmude v. Taylor, is a case regarding the First Amendment rights of parents to have their children not be subjected to LGBTQ+ inclusive storybooks in primary schools. Smith links the ruling to broader concerns about ideological content in public education and suggests it is also a positive sign for advocates of other constitutional rights, such as the Second Amendment, as it shows the Court’s willingness to uphold individual liberties against government overreach.
Tanya observed: “In my opinion, although the cases were wins for conservative points of view, I think that the Medina case is more important to Second Amendment litigation than the Mimmude case. After all, we have seen time and again that Second Amendment cases often involve the state or municipality complaining about the difficulty of following SCOTUS precedent and claiming they need “experts” to figure it out.”
The State of Oregon headlines the news as anti-gun liberal politicians voted to ban rapid-fire devices, while permitting government the latitude to prohibit citizens from carrying a concealed handgun into selected public spaces. While the strict measure echoes the ideology of Kathy Hochul and the New York state legislature to disarm law-abiding citizens, it is just one of many stipulations designed to promote tyranny.
Oregon elected officials were not the only politicians active in hindering basic freedoms as Michigan lawmakers forwarded a bill to ban “ghost guns” and tacked on a rider that prohibit bump stocks. The bill was endorsed by anti-gun democrats.
With Oregon and Michigan supporting and mandates targeting freedom loving Americans, Republicans in Texas opted to nullify Red Flag Gun laws. Governor Greg Abbot deterred residents from facing highly subjective stifling legislation giving prosecutors the leeway to seize firearms in the wake of a domestic dispute, where an individual could face the reality a simple phone call to the authorities resulting to losing their Second Amendment rights.
Finally, in a disappointing development out of North Carolina, the state legislature voted to ban private school educators and staff from carrying a firearm. As “gun free” zones promote lawlessness in the absence of consequence, the audacity of public officials to prohibit access to tools of self-defense supports the notion that delusion is readily apparent in government.
