Immediately after Judge Brett Kavanaugh was nominated to the Supreme Court, NRATV, the media arm of the National Rifle Association, cheered a dissent he wrote that argued bans on assault weapons are unconstitutional under the Second Amendment. That view is far outside of mainstream legal thought.
On July 9, President Donald Trump announced[1] Kavanaugh, a judge on the D.C. Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals, as his nominee to fill[2] the seat vacated by Justice Anthony Kennedy and praised his “impeccable credentials, unsurpassed qualifications, and ... proven commitment to equal justice under the law.” Trump picked[3] his nominee from a shortlist of four right-wing federal appeals court judges, and a mounting number of Democratic senators have announced[4] that they will oppose Kavanaugh’s confirmation.
The National Rifle Association Institute for Legislation Action -- the NRA’s lobbying arm -- put out a press release on July 9 applauding[5] Kavanaugh as an “outstanding choice” and highlighting his “impressive record that demonstrates his strong support for the Second Amendment.”
In a 2011 challenge to D.C.’s assault weapons ban, known as Heller II[6], Kavanaugh split[7] from the rest of the D.C. Circuit Court and wrote a dissenting opinion arguing that[8] “semi-automatic rifles, like semi-automatic handguns, have not traditionally been banned and are in common use by law-abiding citizens for self-defense in the home, hunting, and other lawful uses.” He went[9] as far as to claim that “a ban on a class of arms …. is equivalent to a ban on a category of speech.”
Based on this position, Kavanaugh would consider bans on the type of
