In 2022, the United States Supreme Court decided N.Y. State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, 142 S. Ct. 2111, 2126 (2022). In sum, the decision revisited the court’s rulings in the game-changing Heller and McDonald cases from 2008 and 2010, respectively, finding that the analyses previously used by countless district and circuit courts since then had missed the point of these seminal cases.

The practical effect of this was a widening of the aperture through which radical gun rights groups could attack gun control legislation. This has prompted a surge of lawsuits challenging firearms safety laws, even in cases where those laws had already been found to be constitutional pre-Bruen. Chief among these cases are attempts to overturn state-based assault weapons bans.