Files amicus brief on behalf of petitioners in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) joined Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and 23 other Republican senators in filing an amicus brief for New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, a case currently pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. The brief argues that New York’s laws making it extremely difficult to carry a firearm outside the home violate the Second Amendment’s guarantee of the right to bear arms. The brief emphasizes that by including the right to bear arms in the Constitution, the Framers made a policy choice and explicitly removed from state and federal legislators the ability to second-guess that choice.

Co-signers of the amicus brief include U.S. Sens. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), John Barrasso (R-Wyo.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), John Boozman (R-Ark.), Mike Braun (R-Ind.), John Cornyn (R-Texas), Tom Cotton (R-Ark.), Kevin Cramer (R-N.D.), Mike Crapo (R-Idaho), Steve Daines (R-Mont.), Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), John Hoeven (R-N.D.), Cindy Hyde-Smith (R-Miss.), Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), James Lankford (R-Okla.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Cynthia Lummis (R-Wyo.), Roger Marshall (R-Kan.), Jerry Moran (R-Kan.), Jim Risch (R-Idaho), Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), Rick Scott (R-Fla.), and Thom Tillis (R-N.C.).

The full text of the brief can be found here, and excerpts are below.

“[L]egislators—whether in Albany or Washington, D.C.—have neither the power nor the authority to second-guess the policy judgments made by the Framers and enshrined in the Constitution.”

The Framers’ “decision to guarantee the right of the people to keep and bear arms after weighing all the policy considerations is definitive.”

The danger associated with firearms “was never obscure, [and] was very much part of the reason law-abiding citizens needed arms for protection from others with arms.”

“[E]lected officials swear to support and defend the Constitution, and so must respect when the Framers took a decision out of their hands. The Second Amendment’s guarantee of the right to keep and bear arms cannot be second-guessed by legislators across the country who simply disagree with the choice the Framers made.”

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