Assemblyman Reggie Jones- Sawyer, former Chairman of the Assembly Public Safety Committee said the quiet part out loud almost ten years ago when GOC questioned him about the constitutionality of an anti-gun bill. He might as well have said “The Constitution be damned!”
That’s a hard no-go for us. The Constitution is our foundation – the very bedrock of our nation, which is why GOC fights so hard to defend it. It’s also why we are willing to challenge laws that undermine the Second Amendment – not just here in California but in other states too, because what’s happening there can have a very real impact on what’s happening here. We are paying close attention and so should you.
Every time some idiotic anti-gun bill passes in California, we have to make the difficult decision whether to challenge the law in court. This is infuriating, not just because of the enormous costs, but decisive rulings from the Supreme Court should have stopped the bills from getting out of the gate. Unfortunately, though, Democrat legislators in our own backyard and other states continue to throw crap at the anti-2A wall – hoping it will stick. They’ve given the middle finger to the Heller decision which declared that it’s an individual – rather than a collective right. In the McDonald case, the Court confirmed that this right applies to state and local governments, but blue-state legislatures have snubbed that. And they’ve outrightly ignored the Bruen decision, which requires lower courts adhere to the actual meaning of the words “shall not be infringed.” Can’t get much clearer than that!
In spite of SCOTUS having spent nearly two decades defining the scope of the Second Amendment, the insanity continues.
Are modern, commonly owned semiautomatic rifles, including the AR-15 platform, protected under the Constitution?
The Court recently agreed to hear Viramontes v. Cook County, a case challenging an Illinois ban on AR-15-style rifles and similar semiautomatics. While this case started in Illinois, what happens next will affect families, communities, and freedoms across the country—especially here in California, where the stakes for gun owners have never been higher.
Our “assault weapons” ban restricts popular rifles based largely on specific features and how the guns are constructed. The state, however, argues that there is no actual ban on the AR-15 itself, but it is simply regulating certain “features.” Right.
If the Supreme Court decides that AR-15-style rifles are indeed protected arms under the Second Amendment, current law in California could be turned on it’s head. The question becomes “how could the state allow ownership of a firearm while barring the basic configuration commonly used by millions of Americans?”
How this ultimately pans out remains to be seen; the bottom line is that GOC and GOA wish we didn’t have to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to fight laws passed by a bunch of leftist buffoons. But we do. Thankfully, the Viramontes case gives the Supreme Court a chance to remind every judge in America: Bruen isn’t just advice—it’s the law. When our rights are at stake, courts must follow the Constitution, not subjective opinions or politics.
For more details on the Viramonte case, click HERE.