Supreme Court Hints It Will Lift Gun Ban for Some Drug Users (1)

The US Supreme Court signaled it’s likely to exempt some people from a federal ban on firearm possession by drug users, weighing a case that could buttress the Second Amendment’s gun-rights protections.

Hearing arguments in Washington Monday, a majority of the justices suggested the law can’t be constitutionally applied to a Texas man who the government says admitted to using marijuana several times a week. The Trump administration is defending the prosecution.

The case could narrow a 1968 federal law that bars gun possession by anyone who “is an unlawful user of or addicted to any controlled substance.” As many as 32 states and territories have similar laws, though some affect only drug addicts, not all drug users.

One of the skeptics, Justice Amy Coney Barrett, indicated she viewed the law as overly broad because it would apply to drugs that aren’t dangerous. Barrett said the administration’s position would bar gun possession by anyone who took a spouse’s Ambien, a prescription sleep aid.

“I just don’t see anything in the scheme that actually reflects Congress’s judgment that this makes someone more dangerous,” Barrett told Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Harris, the Trump administration’s lawyer.

More than 200,000 people have been denied gun permits since 1998 because of drug use, according to federal statistics.

The court earlier on Monday declined to consider restoring the gun rights of people convicted of nonviolent felonies, turning away an appeal from a Utah woman convicted 18 years ago of trying to pass a bad check at a grocery store.

Unusual Divide

The drug clash centers on Ali Danial Hemani, a Texas man seeking to dismiss a one-count indictment. The 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals sided with Hemani, ruling that the gun ban can’t be applied to people unless they are using illegal substances while in possession of a firearm. The disputed provision is the one that was used to convict Hunter Biden, the former president’s son.

The two-hour session suggested the high court might divide along unusual lines. Liberal Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Ketanji Brown Jackson joined several of the court’s conservatives in questioning the law’s constitutionality.

Meanwhile, Democratic-appointed Justice Elena Kagan joined Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito in expressing concern that a decision cutting back the law might nullify legitimate safeguards.

“Your argument, it seems to me — I mean, why doesn’t it apply to any drug, whether it’s PCP, methamphetamine, whatever?” Roberts asked Hemani’s lawyer, Erin Murphy.

The Supreme Court’s conservative supermajority has expanded the right to bear arms in recent years but left in place some limits as having a sufficient historical pedigree.

The court in 2024 upheld a federal law disarming people who are under domestic-violence restraining orders. Roberts said in that ruling that the government can ban gun possession by “categories of persons thought by a legislature to present a special danger of misuse.”

The Trump administration says the statute is analogous to founding-era laws that restricted the rights of habitual drunkards because of the risk they would misuse firearms. Hemani’s lawyers say those early laws focused on people who abused alcohol and didn’t affect people who simply had alcoholic beverages on a regular basis.

President Donald Trump came into office vowing to protect Second Amendment rights. But in court, the administration on several occasions has defended restrictions opposed by gun-rights advocates.

The court is scheduled to rule by July in the case, United States v. Hemani, 24-1234.

(Updates with excerpts from argument starting in fifth paragraph.)

To contact the reporter on this story:
Greg Stohr in Washington at gstohr@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story:
Elizabeth Wasserman at ewasserman2@bloomberg.net

Steve Stroth

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