The U.S. Supreme Court will rule on whether people under domestic violence restraining orders have the right to possess firearms, announcing Friday that it will hear a case on the matter during its next term.
The court on Friday agreed to review an appeal by President Joe Biden’s administration of a lower court’s ruling that found that the law ran afoul of the Second Amendment’s “right to keep and bear arms” because it fell outside “our nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”
The case involves a Texas man, Zackey Rahimi, charged with illegal gun possession while subject to a domestic violence restraining order after assaulting his girlfriend. Rahimi challenged the law after being charged under it in 2021.
Rahimi, who had a history of dealing drugs including cocaine, knocked his girlfriend to the ground after an argument in a parking lot, dragged her to his car, shoved her inside, causing her to head to hit the dashboard, according to court papers. After realizing a bystander had seen his actions, according to the filing, Rahimi retrieved a gun and fired a shot.
Rahimi later threatened to shoot his girlfriend. She obtained a court-approved restraining order, but Rahimi was arrested for violating it, the papers said.
The filing said he was involved in five shootings in the Arlington, Texas area between December 2020 and January 2021. That included one in which he fired bullets using a rifle into the home of a person to whom he sold drugs. He was caught with a pistol and rifle during a police search of his home, the papers said.
The New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in February declared that the 1994 was law unconstitutional in a ruling that applied to Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. The 5th Circuit initially had upheld the law but withdrew its opinion following the Supreme Court’s landmark Second Amendment ruling last year.
