Federal court shoots down Minnesota ban on those under 21 carrying guns

By 
 September 28, 2024

Vice President Kamala Harris and President Joe Biden have both spent decades expressing their desire to infringe on gun rights.

Yet those aspirations have gotten harder to achieve in recent years thanks to a series of federal court decisions.

Minnesota ban on those under 21 carrying weapons overturned

According to The Truth About Guns, one of the latest examples came in the form of a ruling earlier this month from the U.S. Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals.

The decision saw the court reject an appeal filed by Minnesota Department of Public Safety Commissioner Bob Jacobson and Mille Lacs County Sheriff Kyle Burton.

They were seeking review of a decision handed down in July by an Eighth Circuit three-judge panel which upheld an earlier ruling from U.S. District Court Judge Katherine Menendez.

In April of 2023, Menendez agreed with arguments put forward by plaintiffs Kristin Worth, Austin Dye, and Axel Anderson that a Minnesota law banning those between the ages of 18 and 20 from carrying weapons is unconstitutional.

Judge: Founders "placed no such restrictions" in Second Amendment

In upholding the district court's ruling, Circuit Court Judge William Benton noted that the Constitution puts age limits on who may run for certain offices.

"In other words, the Founders considered age and knew how to set age requirements," the federal circuit court judge acknowledged.

However, he was quick to point out that they "placed no such restrictions on rights, including those protected by the Second Amendment."

The plaintiffs who challenged Minnesota's carry restrictions were backed by the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC), and it welcomed last week's decision.

Harris doubles down on pledge to ban so-called assault weapons

"This formalizes our victory, and the ban is now officially dead," the FPC was quoted as saying in a statement. "If it wishes to continue defending its tyranny, Minnesota must take its tears to SCOTUS."

Meanwhile, The Guardian reported earlier this month that Harris doubled down on her pledge to seek a ban on semi-automatic firearms.

"I feel very strongly that it’s consistent with the second amendment to say we need an assault weapons ban. They're literally tools of war, they were literally designed to kill a lot of people quickly," she said.

" A free people [claim] their rights, as derived from the laws of nature."
Thomas Jefferson