found that the Trump administration overstepped when it changed course from predecessors and banned bump stocks, which allow a rate of fire comparable to machine guns. The decision came after a gunman in Las Vegas attacked a country music festival with assault rifles equipped with the accessories.
Justice Samuel Alito agreed but wrote a short separate opinion to stress that Congress can change the law. Justice Sonia Sotomayor said in a dissent joined by the court’s liberals and read out loud in the courtroom that she hoped Congress would act. Imposing a ban through regulation rather than legislation during Donald Trump’s presidency took pressure off Republicans to act following the massacre and another mass shooting in Parkland, Florida.
The arguments in the bump stock case, though, were more about whether the ATF had overstepped its authority, not the Second Amendment covering firearms. The plaintiff, Texas gun shop owner and military veteran Michael Cargill, was represented by the New Civil Liberties Alliance, a group funded by conservative donors like the Koch network. His attorneys acknowledged that bump stocks allow for rapid fire but argued that they are different because the shooter has to put in more effort to keep the gun firing.