Gun owners backed by Trump seek Supreme Court win before 2020 vote
WASHINGTON – Gunrights advocates backed by President Donald Trump hope a U.S. Supreme Court clash over New York City restrictions on transporting firearms will be the Second Amendment victory they’ve been seeking for a decade.
With a conservative majority strengthened by two Trump appointees, the court on Monday will hear a case that could produce its first ruling bolstering gun rights since 2010. Its decision probably will come in June in the heat of the presidential campaign.
Three New York City residents say the rules forced them to stop attending shooting competitions and taking licensed handguns to a second home.
There’s just one problem: The restrictions no longer exist.
Faced with a showdown before what probably will be a skeptical court, the city and state have scrapped the strict handgun-transportation rules – and asked the justices to toss out the case without issuing a ruling. City officials are seeking to head off an opinion that could threaten other gun regulations nationwide.
“Any time liberals keep a case out of the Supreme Court, it’s a cause for a sigh of relief for them,” said Adam Winkler, a professor at the University of California, Los Angeles Law School who wrote a book on the fight over the Second Amendment. “The court is not on their side.”
The New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, an affiliate of the National Rifle Association, is joining the three men in pressing the appeal.
New York’s supporters include Everytown for Gun Safety, an advocacy group founded by Michael Bloomberg, who is the founder and majority owner of Bloomberg LP, the parent company of Bloomberg News. Bloomberg, who is seeking the Democratic nomination for president, was mayor of New York from 2002 to 2013.
Under the New York City rules, put in place in 2001, people with a licensed handgun at home were allowed to take it to one of seven shooting ranges in the city but almost nowhere else. Weapons had to be locked and unloaded during travel, and ammunition had to be put in a separate container.
Trump’s top Supreme Court lawyer, Solicitor General Noel Francisco, said in court papers that the restrictions undermined the constitutional right to have a handgun in a house or apartment for self-protection.
“Few laws in the history of our nation, or even in contemporary times, have come close to such a sweeping prohibition on the transportation of arms,” Francisco argued.
The three gun owners say they sued after the organizers of a 2012 New Jersey shooting competition said
New Yorkers couldn’t take part because they couldn’t legally bring their handguns. The residents say competitions give them a chance to improve their shooting proficiency.
One of the three, Staten Island resident Romolo Colantone, also says he’s had to stop taking his handgun to his second home in Hancock, N. Y., in the Catskill Mountains region.
“The Colantone Hancock house is located in a remote area, and as such presents a threat to the safety of myself and my family while there,” Colantone said in a sworn statement in 2013.
The city contends that the residents have adequate opportunities to train within New York City. The gun owners “did not argue, let alone offer any evidence, that the rule meaningfully impaired their ability to train,” New York City Corporation Counsel Zachary Carter argued.
City officials also say Colantone can apply for a license to keep a handgun in his Catskills home.
A federal appeals court upheld the restrictions, saying New Yorkers could go to local shooting ranges, use rented weapons at out-oftown facilities, and acquire additional weapons for second homes.
But the city’s best chance may be that the Supreme Court will conclude the case has become moot. After the justices accepted the case in January, the city amended its regulations to let licensed handgun owners transport their weapons to second homes and shooting ranges outside the five boroughs.