The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit against Washington, D.C. over its law banning certain firearms.
The district is notorious for its failed gun control policies that have done nothing to curb violent crime. Now, one of its most cherished laws is facing a challenge from the federal government.
The lawsuit accuses D.C. of illegally blocking law-abiding residents from possessing common firearms like AR-15 style rifles, many semi-automatic pistols, and some shotguns. It argues that it prevents people from keeping these weapons in their homes for self-defense and other lawful purposes.
The complaint states that the District “continued its efforts to infringe the Second Amendment-protected ‘right of the people to keep and bear arms’ through limiting law-abiding citizens’ ability to register commonly used firearms and criminalizing the possess of firearms that it refuses to register.”
The DOJ further contends that these firearms are “in common use today” and that the bans are “based on little more than cosmetics, appearance, or the ability to attach accessories.”
Fantastic!!! DOJ suing DC over unconstitutional firearm bans https://t.co/VXAxmuVrlo pic.twitter.com/BbaqTzo98o
— Katie Pavlich (@KatiePavlich) December 22, 2025
The lawsuit lays out how the District created an unconstitutional “pattern or practice” of denying registration and arresting people for possessing firearms that the Second Amendment protects. The complaint points out that D.C.’s code “currently prohibits the registration of the AR-15 and other semi-automatic rifles, which makes it illegal for law-abiding citizens to possess these firearms in the home for lawful purposes.”
It further notes that there “is no historically analogous prohibition of the broad ban of firearms that are in common use by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes, such as self-defense inside the home.” This means the District’s laws do not pass the constitutional test that the Supreme Court established in its New York Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen ruling.
🚨JUST IN🚨
— Breanna Morello (@BreannaMorello) December 22, 2025
The DOJ has filed a lawsuit against the District of Columbia’s Metropolitan Police Department (MPD), claiming that the District government and MPD violate the Second Amendment by unconstitutionally prohibiting possession of AR-15-style rifles and many other firearms… pic.twitter.com/qmjK5eLp8b
Attorney General Pam Bondi said in a press release that th lawsuit “underscores our ironclad commitment to protecting the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans.”
She further argued that “living in our nation’s capital should not preclude law-abiding citizens from exercising their fundamental constitutional rights to keep and bear arms.”
I doubt that D.C.’s gun bans will stand up to legal scrutiny, especially because of the Bruen ruling, which requires each modern gun control law to be similar to laws passed during the Founding Era. Back then, there were no laws banning a wide swath of firearms for personal use.
Since that ruling, Democrat-run areas of the country have imposed new restrictions in an attempt to skirt the Supreme Court’s requirements. Many of those efforts have failed. This one will likely meet the same fate.