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Watching 2A
By the Patriot Watch Desk
Published July 17, 2026 at 5:02 AM ET · Updated July 17, 2026 at 6:39 AM ET

Analysis questions whether the DOJ's Second Amendment lawsuits have a fatal flaw

1 independent outlets are covering this story. Verification: Watching — single-source — not yet independently corroborated. Patriot Watch links to original reporting; we don't republish it.

Read the story at The Reload →

What we know

Patriot Watch first flagged this story 1 hr ago, when The Reload reported it. So far this remains a single-source report. The most recent report came 1 hr ago from The Reload. Verification tier: Watching — single-source — not yet independently corroborated.

⚖ The Constitutional Angle

Under Bruen, when the Second Amendment text covers conduct, the government must justify a regulation by showing consistency with the Nation's historical tradition of firearm regulation. Rahimi confirmed the government can meet that burden when it grounds a law in a historical analogue, there the surety and going-armed traditions. A DOJ suit lives or dies on whether such a tradition supports it.

New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Kevin P. Bruen, Superintendent of New York State Police 597 U.S. 1 (2022)
Vote: 6-3 · Opinion: Thomas
New York's requirement that applicants demonstrate 'proper cause' — a special need for self-protection distinguishable from the general community — to obtain an unrestricted public-carry license violates the Fourteenth Amendment by preventing law-abiding citizens with ordinary self-defense needs from exercising their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms in public. The Court held the Second Amendment protects a right to carry handguns publicly for self-defense, and rejected the two-step means-end framework lower courts had applied after Heller.
United States v. Zackey Rahimi 602 U.S. 680 (2024)
Vote: 8-1 · Opinion: Roberts (C.J.)
When an individual has been found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another, that individual may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment. 18 U.S.C. §922(g)(8), which bars firearm possession by persons subject to a domestic-violence restraining order containing such a judicial finding, is facially constitutional. The Court grounded the statute in the combined tradition of surety laws and 'going armed' laws, which permitted preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms.
Precedent facts from the PW Law Library — primary-source verified & independently audited

Conservative & independent coverage (1)

The Reload 1 hr ago
Analysis questions whether the DOJ's Second Amendment lawsuits have a fatal flaw
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