Among the many decisions where the court will likely go full Infowars is New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, a challenge to New York’s law requiring people seeking a concealed carry license to demonstrate “proper cause.” Unsurprisingly, the much-ballyhooed conservative commitment to “states’ rights” only applies when states pass laws that the far-right likes. State legislatures controlled by Democrats have no rights, it seems, to pass laws. It is widely expected that the court will lay waste to New York’s right to regulate guns more stringently than, say, Texas.
Unfortunately for those committed to the prevention of mass murder, it’s already easy to see how the federal ban on convicted girlfriend-beaters getting guns could face a legal challenge leading directly to an overturn at the Supreme Court. As the Kansas City Star reported on Tuesday, Missouri just passed a law in 2021 preventing “local and state law enforcement from enforcing certain federal gun laws.” And Missouri wants to make sure every man who beats women can collect as much lady-killing firepower as he desires: “[S]tate legislators in 2016 voted to allow convicted domestic abusers to carry firearms.”
Never let anyone bamboozle you into thinking that GOP enthusiasm for abortion bans is about anything but hating women. It certainly isn’t about “life.”
While it’s still a little unclear how this could end up in litigation, one should have little doubt about the dangers ahead. Regardless of who sues who, Missouri has set up a showdown over whose law-making power around guns matters more: Congress or the states? And they have a Supreme Court whose answer will likely be, “depends on which government makes it easier to shoot up a grocery store or elementary school.”
— Amanda Marcotte in Congress May Actually Get Somewhere on Gun Safety — But Republicans’ Misogyny Is Getting in the Way