The 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals ruled on Tuesday to uphold a federal law prohibiting illegal immigrants from possessing firearms, despite a recent Supreme Court decision on gun rights that requires firearm regulations to align with the historical tradition of firearm regulation in the country.
In their decision, the three-judge panel concluded that the Supreme Court’s ruling has not invalidated the circuit court’s previous decision, which states that the Second Amendment does not apply to those in the country illegally.
“We should not extend rights to illegal aliens any further than what the law requires,” wrote US Circuit Judge James Ho.
The ruling comes after an appeal from Jose Paz Medina-Cantu, who was arrested in 2022 for illegally possessing a handgun while in the US after a prior deportation. Medina-Cantu, who was sentenced to 15 months in prison, argued that the gun charge violated his Second Amendment rights, asserting that he should have that right despite not being a lawful citizen. His lawyers cited the 2022 Supreme Court decision that established the “historical tradition” requirement, arguing that there is no tradition of disarming individuals based on citizenship status.
However, the appeals court found that the recent Supreme Court ruling “did not unequivocally abrogate our precedent that the plain text of the Second Amendment does not encompass illegal aliens.”
“The Second Amendment protects the right of ‘the people’ to keep and bear arms. Our court has held that the term ‘the people’ under the Second Amendment does not include illegal aliens,” Judge Ho wrote.
“As to common sense, an illegal alien does not become ‘part of a national community’ by unlawfully entering it, any more than a thief becomes an owner of property by stealing it,” he added.
