Michigan files felony charges against drivers caught with unlicensed pistols

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What we know

Michigan is filing felony charges against drivers who are caught with unlicensed pistols. The charges apply to individuals carrying handguns without the proper licensing.

Patriot Watch first flagged this story 3 hr ago, when Bearing Arms reported it. So far this remains a single-source report. The most recent report came 3 hr ago from Bearing Arms.

⚖ The Constitutional Angle

Bruen struck down New York's special-need requirement for a public-carry license and set the governing test: when the Second Amendment's text covers conduct, the government must justify the restriction with a historical tradition of comparable firearm regulation. Michigan's felony charges for an unlicensed pistol must rest on such a tradition, not a modern licensing preference alone.

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.

Precedent facts from the PW Law Library — primary-source verified & independently audited