The Supreme Court on Friday upheld a federal statute that bans gun possession by individuals who are subject to a domestic violence-related restraining order.
The 8-1 decision in United States v. Rahimi, in which only Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, reverses a previous Fifth Circuit ruling on the matter.
“Since the founding, our Nation’s firearm laws have included provisions preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms,” writes Chief Justice John Roberts, adding that the federal statute at hand “fits comfortably within this tradition.”
The case was brought by Zackey Rahimi, who allegedly assaulted his girlfriend and threatened to shoot her if she told anyone. His girlfriend obtained a restraining order that suspended his handgun license and banned him from possessing firearms.
Rahimi, an alleged drug dealer in Texas, was later accused of threatening another woman with a gun. He was charged with assault with a deadly weapon. He also opened fire in public five times, including when he fired into the air at a fast-food restaurant because his friend’s credit card was declined.
When police carried out a search warrant of Rahimi’s home after the shootings, they uncovered weapons, leading authorities to charge him with violating the federal the federal statute at hand, § 922(g)(8).
Rahimi pursued a Second Amendment challenge to the law but pleaded guilty and was sentenced to more than six years in prison after a judge rejected his challenge.
The Fifth Circuit first affirmed his conviction, but later found the federal statute to be unconstitutional under the Supreme Court’s decision in N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n, Inc. v. Bruen, which instructs courts to judge gun rights restrictions by looking to early American history as a guide.
A three-judge panel of the Fifth Circuit concluded that the federal law is not “consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”
However, Roberts writes for the majority that “some courts have misunderstood the methodology of our recent Second Amendment cases. These precedents were not meant to suggest a law trapped in amber.” Otherwise, the Second Amendment would only provide protection to “muskets and sabers,” he said.
“Why and how the regulation burdens the right are central to this inquiry,” he adds. “For example, if laws at the founding regulated firearm use to address particular problems, that will be a strong indicator that contemporary laws imposing similar restrictions of similar reasons fall within a permissible category of regulations.”
Thomas, meanwhile, argued in his dissent that “not a single historical regulation justifies the statute at issue.” Thomas authored the Bruen decision in 2022. That decision struck down a New York law that placed numerous limits on carrying guns outside the home.