by Ben Whedon
The Department of Justice on Wednesday sued Colorado over its ban on high-capacity magazines.
Colorado currently bars the sale and possession of magazines that can hold more than 15 rounds.
The lawsuit, filed in the District of Colorado, alleges that the state law uses “politically charged rhetoric” to describe the arms it bans and asserts that the state’s definition of a “large-capacity magazine” is a “misnomer” since magazines that hold more than 15 rounds are “standard capacity” for many common firearms.
“Colorado’s ban on certain magazines is political virtue signaling at the expense of Americans’ constitutional right to keep and bear arms,” Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon said in a statement. “Under my direction, the Division’s Second Amendment Section will continue to defend law-abiding Americans’ rights against unconstitutional restrictions on their right to possess arms which are owned by tens of millions of their fellow citizens.”
The DOJ asserts that the state ban is a “ban on an arm in common use for lawful [purposes] by law-abiding citizens” and that it therefore violates the Second Amendment.
“The Magazine Ban uses politically charged rhetoric to describe the arms it bans. The Magazine Ban’s characterization of these magazines as ‘large capacity’ is a misnomer, because magazines capable of holding more than 15 rounds are, in fact, standard capacity magazines for many popular firearms, including the AR-15 rifle, the most popular rifle in America. The United States will not adopt the State’s tendentious term,” the lawsuit says.
“Law-abiding Americans own and use for lawful purposes literally hundreds of millions of magazines such as those banned by the State. A detachable magazine is an integral
part of most semi-automatic firearms, including the AR-15 rifle,” the lawsuit adds.
The U.S. Supreme Court has, in recent years, issued several rulings on gun rights, most notably the Bruen decision, which established a standard of evaluating gun laws based on historical gun regulations in the U.S.
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Ben Whedon is a reporter for Just the News. Zachery Schmidt is the digital editor of The Star News Network and contributed to this story.
