supreme court Disabled The Trump administration on Friday banned bump stocks on ideological grounds, ending a nationwide ban on the devices that turn semi-automatic rifles into guns capable of firing hundreds of rounds per minute.
The Biden administration defended the ban in the Supreme Court after it was first put into place by the Trump administration in response to the 2017 Las Vegas mass shooting, the deadliest in U.S. history, in which the shooter used a bump-stocked gun that killed 60 people and injured hundreds more.
The Trump and Biden administrations then had the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) newly classify the device as a machine gun under long-standing federal law, making possession of the device a criminal offense, without violating the Second Amendment.
In a 6-3 decision written by conservative Justice Clarence Thomas, the court ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, finding that the ATF had overly applied the law.
“We conclude that [a] A semi-automatic rifle equipped with a bump stock is not a “machine gun” because it does not fire more than one bullet “by the single action of the trigger,” Thomas said. I wrote it by quoting Statutory definition.
Conservative Justice Samuel Alito, who joined Justice Thomas, also emphasized in a separate letter that there is a “simple solution” that would allow for a nationwide ban on bump stocks.
“Congress can change the law. If the ATF had stuck to its previous interpretation, it likely would have done so already. Now that the situation is clear, Congress can act,” Alito wrote.
Austin-based gun store owner Michael Cargill challenged the bump stock ban after turning in two bump stocks in 2019. He had the backing of the National Rifle Association and other major gun advocacy groups.
“More than five years ago, I took an oath to defend the United States Constitution, even as the sole plaintiff in this lawsuit, and that’s exactly what I’ve done,” Cargill said in a statement.
The court’s three liberals dissented in an opinion written by Justice Sonia Sotomayor, who read her dissent from the court, a rare moment that underscored how important the court felt the case was.
“If I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, I call it a duck. A semi-automatic rifle with a bump stock ‘automatically fires multiple rounds with a single pull of the trigger without the need for manual reloading,'” Sotomayor wrote.
“I respectfully disagree, as does Congress, because I call it a machine gun.”
The Supreme Court is expected to rule in the coming days on another high-profile gun case involving the Second Amendment. The justices are considering whether a federal law that makes it a crime for people subject to domestic violence restraining orders to possess guns is constitutional.
Updated 10:47 a.m. ET
