SCOTUS Keeps Hardware Bans on Hold, but Makes Interesting Move on Prohibited Person Case

Yet again, the Supreme Court’s orders from its weekly conference have been released with no news on any of the five lawsuits challenging bans on so-called assault weapons and large capacity magazines. 

Sorry, 19th*.

I forgot one was a reschedule.

— Kostas Moros (@MorosKostas) June 8, 2026

I still think SCOTUS is waiting on the Third Circuit to issue its en banc opinion in the challenges to New Jersey’s gun and magazine ban, which could create a circuit court split on the constitutionality of banning commonly-owned arms. As some have theorized, though, the Third Circuit could be waiting on SCOTUS to issue its opinions in Wolford v. Lopez and U.S. v. Hemani to see if those decisions will provide any guidance to lower courts. 

If that is the case, then we’re not getting a Third Circuit decision before the Court adjourns for its summer recess, and what the justices will do with the five hardware cases at the end of this term is anyone’s guess. They could keep the lawsuits on ice over the summer, but that would be pretty unusual. I’m hoping they’ll break with tradition and hold the cases over, but if not then a a grant, vacate, and remand would still be better than an outright rejection, even if it means these cases won’t be back before the Court for several more years.

The justices did make one decision today that will benefit some gun owners. 

The cert petition filed by the federal government in a case where the Fifth Circuit ruled that the felon gun ban is unconstitutional as applied to the defendant whose “sole predicate offense… is his failure to pay child support” has been denied. https://t.co/ZNffWkgYWN pic.twitter.com/HvVCK0vUBX

— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) June 8, 2026

That means that the Fifth Circuit’s decision stands, and at least in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Texas, failure to pay child support will not, by itself, lead to an automatic revocation of the right to keep and bear arms, at least as long as no debt remains outstanding.  

Solicitor General D. John Sauer had requested the court hang on to Cockerham until the Hemani decision was released, before granting cert, vacating the lower court’s decision, and sending the case back to the Fifth Circuit for further review. Instead, SCOTUS simply turned away the government’s challenge to the Fifth Circuit decision and let it stand.  

That doesn’t necessarily mean that the Supreme Court agrees with the Fifth Circuit’s decision or how it got there, but it would have been a pretty simple thing to do as Sauer requested, and the justices chose to simply dismiss the government’s appeal outright.

Edward Cockerham pled guilty to possessing a firearm as a prohibited person based on a felony conviction for failure to pay child support; a crime for which he was not sentenced to prison. The Fifth Circuit ruled that Cockerham’s failure to pay child support was historically analogous to failure to pay a debt, and in the Founding era once the debt was paid the debtor was released from prison with no further punishment. A lifetime ban on possessing firearms, particularly when Cockerham had squared up his child support payments, is untenable under the Supreme Court’s “text, history, and tradition” test, according to the Fifth Circuit. 

The Fifth Circuit didn’t weigh in on whether a prohibition on gun possession would be okay if Cockerham hadn’t paid the child support he owed, so there are some circumstances where Section 922(g)(1) might still be applied going forward. SCOTUS could, however, cast more doubt on lifetime prohibitions on gun possession for non-violent offenses depending on how broadly the justices rule in Hemani; a decision that come come as early as Thursday of this week.  

Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their radical gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

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