Earlier this month, in United States v. Rahimi, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit struck down as unconstitutional a decades-old law barring people subject to domestic violence restraining orders from possessing firearms. The ruling comes on the heels of the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in New York State Rifle and Pistol Association v. Bruen last term, which held that the Second Amendment protects the right to carry guns outside the home. Bruen also created a new history-and-tradition test for determining whether gun-control regulations are constitutional, which has led some lower courts to now rule differently on challenges to gun laws—including the Fifth Circuit. In this episode, two scholars and experts on the Second Amendment— Amy Swearer of the Heritage Foundation and Adam Winkler of UCLA School of Law—join to break down the Rahimi decision, which the U.S. Supreme Court may review in a future term, and explore the new landscape of Second Amendment law after Bruen. Host Jeffrey Rosen moderates.
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Today’s episode was produced by Lana Ulrich, Bill Pollock, and Sam Desai. It was engineered by Greg Scheckler and John Popp. Research was provided by Sophia Gardell, Emily Campbell, Liam Kerr, Sam Desai, and Lana Ulrich.
Participants
Amy Swearer is a Senior Fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation. She has testified before Congress on gun policy issues and was a primary author of the recently published Heritage Foundation ebook, “The Essential Second Amendment.”
Adam Winkler is the Connell Professor of Law at the UCLA School of Law. He is the author of Gunfight: The Battle over the Right to Bear Arms in America (2011), as well as We the Corporations: How American Businesses Won Their Civil Rights.
Jeffrey Rosen is the president and CEO of the National Constitution Center, a nonpartisan nonprofit organization devoted to educating the public about the U.S. Constitution. Rosen is also professor of law at The George Washington University Law School and a contributing editor of The Atlantic.
Additional Resources
• United States v. Rahimi (5th Cir. 2023)
• NY State Rifle and Pistol Assoc. v. Bruen (2022)
• “Senate hears about legal fallout from Supreme Court gun decision,” Roll Call (Mar. 2023)
• “The Essential Second Amendment,” Heritage Foundation ebook
• Adam Winkler, Gunfight: The Battle Over the Right to Bear Arms in America (2013)
TRANSCRIPT
This transcript may not be in its final form, accuracy may vary, and it may be updated or revised in the future.
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