Free Republic

The Supreme Court rejected a bid by New York gun retailers on Wednesday to block a slew of new gun control laws in the state, which they argued violate their Second Amendment rights and hurt their businesses. There were no noted dissents in the order or explanations from the justices for their decision. “We are disappointed that not one of the nine justices saw fit to grant the plaintiffs some stay of enforcement of the new laws against them,” Paloma Capanna, the lead attorney for the New York gun retailers, told Fox News Digital on Wednesday. “We are challenging the...

FOX News personality Geraldo Rivera backed President Biden’s push for an “assault weapons” ban and said that the “AR” in AR-15 stands for “automatic rifle” on Tuesday’s The Five. Newsweek quoted Rivera telling the co-hosts, “I submit to you, ladies and gentlemen, there is no legitimate reason … to have an AR-15.” He described the AR-15 as a “machine gun” that people own in order to make them feel “macho.”

After years of flip-flopping, the ATF has issued a rule recharacterizing guns with pistol braces, making millions of currently owned guns subject to federal "short-barrel" rifle registration, together with a $200 tax. The effect of this rule change is particularly potent in Connecticut, where existing laws banning so-called "assault rifles" are immediately triggered. Owners there of handguns with pistol braces cannot merely remove the brace if the weapon has a "forward pistol grip" or "second hand grip"; these guns are effectively rendered instantly illegal due to the fickle federal rule change. Prior to the rule change, Connecticut gun-owners could legally...

President Joe Biden spoke on the Martin Luther King Jr. Day and reiterated his belief that it is time to “ban the number of bullets that go in a magazine.” Mediate.com published the portion of Biden’s MLK speech in which he pledges to ban firearms which Democrats label “assault weapons.” Biden said, “I am going to get ‘assault weapons’ banned. I did it once and I’m going to do it again.” He added, “And ban the number of bullets that go in a magazine.”

At least 80 county sheriffs and prosecutors have vowed not to enforce the new Illinois gun control law that bans 170 kinds of semi-automatic rifles and places limits on ammunition magazines. “The right to keep and bear arms for defense of life, liberty and property is regarded as an inalienable right by the people,” said Iroquois County Sheriff Clinton Perzee. “I, among many others, believe that [House Bill 5471] is a clear violation of the 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution,” he added. Perzee said he would not use his jail to detain people solely for violating the new gun...

Illinois’ new assault weapons ban is only days old, but it’s already on uncertain legal footing. Republican lawmakers and gun shop owners say so. But so do constitutional law scholars. Illinois Democrats who crafted the legislation — which took effect Tuesday and was enacted in response to the Highland Park Fourth of July parade mass shooting in which seven people were killed — say they’ve balanced safety concerns with Second Amendment arguments over individuals’ right to bear arms. But a U.S. Supreme Court decision last year could upend the new law and other gun restrictions elsewhere, legal scholars say. In...

Lee David Wilkerson from Escambia County FL Sheriff's OfficeThe Escambia County Sheriff's Office reported an incident occurred on January 4, 2023, outside the Bingo Paradise hall in Pensacola, Florida. Two women were reported to be approaching the entrance. One of the women told deputies they had come to obtain jumper cables from her mother, who was in the bingo hall. Suspect Lee David Wilkerson, 38 years old, is reported to have got into an altercation with the women, pulled out a pistol, hit one of the women on the head with the pistol, then fired several shots as the women...

Republican lawmakers and gun rights groups blasted the Biden administration over a new rule that tightens regulations on pistol stabilizing braces. The Bureau of Alcohol, Firearms, Tobacco and Explosives (ATF) finalized a new regulation Friday that will treat guns with stabilizing accessories like short-barreled rifles, which require a federal license to own under the National Firearms Act. The move is part of a comprehensive gun crime strategy President Biden announced in April 2021, in response to the massacre at a grocery store in Boulder, Colorado, where a gunman using a stabilizing brace killed 10 people. A stabilizing brace was also...

On Monday, far-left New Mexico state Rep. Patricia Roybal-Caballero (D-Bernalillo) dropped the Democrats’ first anti-gun bill of the 2023 Legislative Session, H.B. 50. The bill is a magazine ban that would make violations of the bill if passed, felons. The bill reads, “It is unlawful for a person to possess or transfer a large-capacity magazine within New Mexico, except when the person is: a resident of another state who transports a large-capacity magazine into New Mexico for use exclusively in an established shooting competition” or “a peace officer, in accordance with the policies of the peace officer’s law enforcement agency,”...

The facts about the Second Amendment in a short video.

The mother of the woman killed by US Capitol Police on January 6th, 2021 arrested today... In Newport News, Virginia a First-Grade teacher in critical condition with life-threatening injuries. A six-year-old student in custody... "in a free country professionals should not lose their jobs and licenses because they express a political opinion contrary to the licensing body" Canada's Opposition leader Pierre Poilievre speaking out on the move against Dr. Jordan Peterson... Portugal and the Netherlands joining the US aligned anti-Russia pro-Ukraine bloc of nations in requiring COVID testing... A Ukrainian drone brought down early Saturday morning over waters near Sevastopol...

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit handed down a 13-3 decision Friday striking down the regulatory gun control that banned bump stocks under former President Donald Trump. Reuters reported that the court intimated that actions on guns should be taken by Congress rather than the executive branch. Circuit Judge Jennifer Walker Elrod wrote the majority opinion for the Fifth Circuit and also opined that the framers of the bump stock ban did not provide “fair warning that possession of a non-mechanical bump stock is a crime.”

The open carry of firearms is strong, protected, symbolic, and political speech. It sends a clear, specific political message: The power of government is limited by the Constitution.The government is not allowed to disarm free people who are peaceable. Symbolic political speech is protected by the First Amendment. From mtsu.edu:Symbolic speech consists of nonverbal, nonwritten forms of communication, such as flag burning, wearing arm bands, and burning of draft cards. It is generally protected by the First Amendment unless it causes a specific, direct threat to another individual or public order.The simple wearing or carrying of firearms is not a...

--A Brazilian Supreme Court judge on Wednesday issued a four-day ban on carrying firearms in the capital as a precautionary measure ahead of the January 1 inauguration of President-elect Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva. In his ruling that temporarily suspends the licenses of registered gun owners, Judge Alexandre de Moraes wrote that "terrorist groups financed by shameless magnates" have been committing crimes against the rule of law in recent weeks, which is why public safety had to be made secure via a temporary firearms ban. If a registered gun owner is caught in Brasilia with a firearm in those four...

The Second Amendment protects the right to people to "keep and bear arms," and at its core the right to self-defense, [judge] McConnell observed. [Reporter]The ban was a reasonable and measured approach to restricting large-capacity magazines, which in practice easily convert handguns into semi-automatic weapons capable of rapid fire, he said.

On Thursday, former NFL player Jack Brewer testified at a Congressional hearing on school shootings. Brewer, who works with young men through his non-profit,the Jack Brewer Foundation, has spoken out about how fatherlessness contributes to crime and violence. I’ll never forget being shot at and seeing a stray pellet skim my cousin’s arm. I was a young kid, with all the world in front of me. I was a straight-A student, a great multi-sport athlete, and even director of my church choir. If I was caught with that gun in my pocket, I would not be testifying before you today....

Sen. Thom Tillis’ (R-NC) amnesty push is dead. That might be the best political Christmas gift in years—it’s undoubtedly the best news coming from the Hill in a long time. Tillis was working with Democrat defector Krysten Sinema (I-AZ) to get millions of illegal aliens on the citizenship track. You all know the details of the poison pill stipulation in the bill. The first 2 million Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals recipients would be able to sponsor their extended family members when they’ve completed the process. It didn’t secure the border or remove the issue from the table. It just...

The House Judiciary Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism and Homeland Security held a hearing Thursday on finding a solution to gun violence, and the difference of opinion between Democrats and Republicans was put on full display. Passions ran high given the sensitivity of the issues involved, as liberal lawmakers focused on weapons and conservatives on the people who use them. Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-La., a former judge who handled felony cases, was in the latter group and focused on the need to instill morality in people, citing Judeo-Christian principles. He went so far as to say it is the bedrock of...

HARRISBURG, PA — Future sales of assault weapons and any multi-burst trigger activator would be prohibited in Pennsylvania under legislation poised to be introduced in the state House. Two Democratic representatives, Benjamin Sanchez of Montgomery County Aerion Abney of Allegheny County, are co-sponsoring the assault weapons bill. Sanchez is sponsoring separate legislation that would prohibit the trigger activators. In a memo to colleagues, Sanchez and Abney noted that high-capacity semi-automatic rifles in the style of or similar to an AR-15 were found at the mass shooting sites of an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas; an Orlando nightclub; an elementary school...

Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont (D) is weighing a push to end or repeal a grandfathering clause in a gun control bill in order to force residents to hand over any AR-15s. The CT Mirror noted that Connecticut’s General Assembly has passed two “assault weapons” bans, and each time, the bans had a grandfather clause, allowing those who already owned the banned firearms to keep them.