‘Unconstitutional’: Judge overturns Illinois gun ban
A federal judge overturned an Illinois gun ban on Friday for being “an unconstitutional affront to the Second Amendment.”
Illinois Governor JB Pritzker last year signed the Protect Illinois Communities Act (PICA), which banned hundreds of types of guns, including semi-automatic firearms. It also banned large-capacity magazines along with various gun accessories and attachments. Another provision required taxpayers who already owned such firearms to put their names in a state registry. The law was reportedly passed in response to a mass shooting at an Independence Day parade in Highland Park in 2022.
But on Friday, US District Judge Stephen McGlynn issued a permanent injunction against the law, including the gun ban and the registry. He ruled that PICA is “unconstitutional under the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution as applied to the states by the Fourteenth Amendment.”
‘Convenient to a ruling class’
In his ruling, Judge McGlynn wrote a scathing criticism of the elite class and its relentless crusade to disarm American citizens:
“Sadly, there are those who seek to usher in a sort of post-Constitution era where the citizens’ individual rights are only as important as they are convenient to a ruling class,” he stated. “Seeking ancient laws that may partner well with a present-day infringement on a right proclaimed in the Bill of Rights without reading it in conjunction with the aforementioned history is nonsense.”
“The oft-quoted phrase that ‘no right is absolute’ does not mean that fundamental rights precariously subsist subject to the whims, caprice, or appetite of government officials or judges,” he added.
Judge McGlynn could have been referring to politicians like Joe Biden, who two years ago remarked that “never was the Second Amendment meant to be absolute.” That was Biden’s justification for increasing funding to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), which has implemented the toughest crackdown on gun owners in American history.
Pritzker to appeal
Governor Pritzker and Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul have pledged to appeal the ruling, according to CNN.
“Despite those who value weapons of war more than public safety, this law was enacted to and has protected Illinoisans from the constant fear of being gunned down in places where they ought to feel secure,” said Pritzker spokesman Alex Gough. Gough did not explain how being a law abiding and disarmed citizen in an area where criminals possess guns would lead to security.
