In Washington, D.C., a gun cannot be legally owned unless it is registered, and it cannot be registered if it qualifies as an "assault weapon" under D.C. law. That policy, the U.S. Justice Department argues in a lawsuit it filed this week in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, violates the Second Amendment by arbitrarily banning guns that are commonly used for lawful purposes.
The lawsuit, which seems to be the first case pursued by a new Second Amendment Section within the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division, "underscores our ironclad commitment to protecting the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans," Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Monday. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, who runs the Civil Rights Division, said she is determined to "defend American citizens from unconstitutional restrictions [on] commonly used firearms."
