The Supreme Court has agreed to hear two cases next term that will pit gun rights advocates against local governments seeking to restrict access to AR-15 rifles, signaling potential reconsideration of municipal bans that have survived legal challenges for years.
The justices will examine restrictions imposed by Cook County, Illinois, and Connecticut when the court reconvenes in October. The cases arrive amid a split among federal appeals courts over whether states and localities can constitutionally ban semiautomatic rifles that have become ubiquitous in American homes, with an estimated 30 million AR- and AK-style weapons in circulation nationwide.
The move represents a significant shift in the court's posture. Just months earlier, in June 2025, the court had declined to hear a challenge to Maryland's AR-15 ban, a setback for gun rights groups. But Justice Brett Kavanaugh's dissent in that rejection offered a roadmap for future challenges, suggesting at least one member of the majority was open to reconsidering such bans.
In his dissent, Kavanaugh drew a direct comparison between AR-15s and handguns, noting both are semiautomatic weapons used by law-abiding citizens for self-defense. "AR-15s are semi-automatic, but so too are most handguns," he wrote, highlighting the functional similarities that gun advocates say should make AR-15s similarly protected under the Second Amendment.
Gun rights advocates seized on that opening, arguing the rifles fall squarely within the protection established by the court's landmark 2022 ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, which expanded gun ownership rights. They contend AR-15s are "in common use" for self-defense and framed the weapon as a modern equivalent of the rifles carried during the American Revolution and westward expansion.
"The AR-15 platform rifle is the modern descendant of the rifles that were borne by the militiamen of the Revolution and the pioneers who struck out West in search of a better life," gun advocates argued in their brief challenging Cook County's restrictions. "The question can be fairly asked, if the Second Amendment does not protect it, what could it possibly protect?"
Cook County officials countered that democratically elected leaders face clear evidence of the weapon's danger. "For over three decades, the democratically elected officials of respondent Cook County, Illinois, have been faced with the overwhelming, mounting, and unrefuted evidence showing that assault rifles are the weapon of choice for criminals and terrorists set on quickly massacring innocents," the county stated in its response.
Author James Rodriguez: "The court's decision to hear these cases signals that Kavanaugh's dissent was more than a throwaway complaint, and the Second Amendment's expansion may have further to run."
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