MrTriple

Any updates on this? I really don't understand why Maag wants it moved back to state court. I'm hoping the federal judge tells him to pound sand. Which, ironically, would actually benefit Maag (and the rest of us, too).

The problem is the State Supreme Court may do what they did in the Brown case, which was to completely ignore the Second Amendment question and find another reason to rule against the plaintiff, creating a body of bad case law that SCOTUS wouldn't be inclined to take. It would be better to stay in federal court.

Yeah, there's no reason to move it back. As I've said before, any FOID case has to go through the federal courts, so I don't understand the strategy here.

Leaving aside the seriousness of the case, I absolutely love the plaintiff's name.

Whenever I see the gun control movement doing stupid stuff like this, it doesn't strike me as the sort of behavior you'd expect if they were truly winning the war on guns.

Excellent news! Federal court was always the right avenue!

The public interest argument is weaker now than in the past. Combined with the fact that most support for gun control is very soft and non-committal at best (and how insane the gun control movement has become) these "public interest" arguments are really starting to sound unhinged and out of touch.

I don't either, but I would observe that gun control has been in decline across the nation for over several decades at this point, so whatever laws the blue states try passing are essentially doomed to get struck down by the courts in due time. While I could see them trying to shift the culture in a more anti-gun direction, the shift has to be organic or else it will fail, especially since people don't like cultural astroturfing. As for constitutional amendments, they'll never get the votes needed to make it happen, and the fact that they are even considering such action (Newsom) really doesn't reflect well on their prospects. They wouldn't pull this one out of their hat if they had better options available to them, since the idea of gutting the Second Amendment is politically toxic.

But that's the thing: Bruen is a panacea, and in a way that Heller and McDonald were not. The whole point of text/history/tradition is to make it effectively impossible for many forms of gun control to survive long-term. But in the short term, you're unfortunately gonna have judges who either misapply Bruen or resist applying it properly. That's why you have SCOTUS and the appellate courts. And even they have various options for dealing with the problem that don't necessarily involve granting cert, such as GVR'ing cases (Bianchi for example). Also, look at how aggressive SCOTUS is being with 2A cases. They could've just denied cert in cases like Bianchi; they didn't. They could've ignored us completely on Bevis; they didn't. That didn't happen post-Heller, now it is happening, and it's having an effect. We got a hearing on Barnett in under 50 days; that's unheard of for civil cases. You can thank SCOTUS for that. And the average American normie isn't questioning the legitimacy of the Court; that's a media fiction. Sure, the idea has some traction on the left, but I can guarantee you that the more strategic thinkers understand the risk in doing so, and like ignoring the courts, this is nothing but political bluster. Once you start ignoring rulings you don't like, your enemies will begin ignoring rulings you do.

There's no need to doom. It makes no sense whatsoever in light of the extremely positive developments we're seeing on guns legally, politically, and culturally, and only serves to demoralize people. Yes, we'll lose in state court, that's to be expected. Yes, the federal cases will take time. But Bruen fundamentally changed things, which is why the gun control movement has absolutely lost their minds. They wouldn't be acting the way they are if they genuinely thought they were winning.

Let's be honest: The state courts in Illinois are not, and never will be, a suitable venue for any Second Amendment case. Your only option is to file in federal court. Forget the state courts altogether. I still don't understand why these cases were filed in state court at all to begin with. There was never going to be an outcome different than this. The same goes for the FOID case out of Sangamon. I respect Guns Save Life for what they're doing, but why wasn't that case filed in federal court, aside from questions of financial resources?

Not to sound arrogant, but there was no way we were ever going to win at the State Supreme Court given their composition. It's like being surprised that the Fifth Circuit issues pro-gun rulings; the composition tells you everything you need to know. And any premature celebration was done in light of this fact, and wasn't because of leaks or some sort of advanced knowledge on the President's part.

I'm of the opinion that the movement is behaving recklessly and impulsively, at least on the whole. It's certainly possible that individual advocates are thinking strategically, but if their goal is the long-term survival of their movement, this isn't the way to do it. This is self-defeating behavior that will cause their movement to implode. I'm also not sold on the idea they're using this to discredit the Supreme Court, since I really think EVERYONE (including us) overestimates how popular gun control is (it isn't) and I really don't think people are gonna care if the Court strikes some law down. The public approved of Bruen and I doubt the reaction to Rahimi will be any different. A lot of whining from the advocates that will be quickly ignored by the public. And I also doubt that the gun control movement will still exist in 50 years when there MIGHT be another chance to flip the court.

It isn't so much a question of reliability, it's more a question of what sort of arguments would be presented in federal versus state court. If we want SCOTUS to take a FOID case, the questions presented in the lower courts need to directly address the merits of the FOID Act, but in a manner that the High Court would be willing to accept them. As we saw with Brown, the State Supreme Court went out of it's way to avoid addressing the Second Amendment question and tried getting the case thrown out on some other basis. If Brown were appealed to SCOTUS they'd likely reject it for that reason. That's because the State Supreme Court cannot rule on the FOID without dooming it. If they uphold it, that opens a path straight to SCOTUS. And they will never strike it down, so that isn't even worth mentioning. More likely than not they'll pull another Brown in this case, as it's the only viable option available to them. Any FOID lawsuit must be federal.

I'm not the least bit surprised. We need federal cases, not state.