Comment by Jim Campbell
March 31, 2019
There are additional finding as discussed in the video below that seem to benefit gun owners in CA.
The 9th Circuit Court of appeals, at one time the circuit with the most frequently overturned cases by the Supreme Court has changed its make up.
No longer a rubber stamp for leftist causes and absurdity, three conservatives now sit on its panel.
Judge Roger T. Benitez born in Cuba under the dictatorship of Fidel Castro and appointed to the bench by President George W. Bush made his ruling.
The 9th Circuit Court has already heard the course twice and agreed with the Florida Judge who overturned the ban.
This was part of California’s far leftist Governor, Gavin Newsom’s attack on the Second Amendment.
He will likely continue to appeal it, but where?
The Supreme Court has not taken any new anti gun legislation since the land mark Heller case.
Trump nominates three conservatives to Ninth Circuit Court.
All three from CA without Diane Feinstein’s Approval
President Donald Trump has nominated conservatives Patrick Bumatay, Daniel Collins and Kenneth Kiyul Lee to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris said they will try to block the nominees. (They only wish they had the power.)
The recent deaths of the liberal lions Judge Stephen Reinhardt this year and Judge Harry Pregerson in 2017 has given Trump an opportunity to move the court more toward the center.
Both of those judges were President Jimmy Carter appointments and were considered among the most left-leaning judges in the nation.
A third judge, Judge Alex Kozinski, was conservative and was a President Ronald Reagan appointment, but retired last December, creating a third vacancy from California.
The Ninth Circuit has 29 judge=ships, and with these three vacancies there are seven open seats total.
Previous to the nominations of earlier this week, Trump had nominated Bridget Bade, Eric Miller, and Ryan Nelson.
He has one more nomination to make for this court.
But these all will be bruising nomination battles, if history is any judge.
Currently, it is nearly impossible for conservatives to argue before the court and have any Republican-appointed judges on the panel.
And the Ninth Circuit is known to have many cases reversed by the U.S. Supreme Court, earning it the nickname “The Nutty Ninth.”
(About 78 percent of the cases appealed from the Ninth to the Supreme Court are reversed.)
All three who were nominated this week are considered conservatives, are from California and are members of the conservative Federalist Society.
In one of the strongest judicial statements in favor of the Second Amendment to date, Judge Roger T. Benitez of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of California determined on Friday that California’s ban on commonly possessed firearm magazines violates the Second Amendment.
The case is Duncan v. Becerra.
The NRA-supported case had already been up to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit on the question of whether the law’s enforcement should be suspended during proceedings on its constitutionality.
Last July, a three judge panel of the Ninth Circuit upheld Judge Benitez’s suspension of enforcement and sent the case back to him for further proceedings on the merits of the law itself.
Judge Benitez rendered his opinion late Friday afternoon and handed Second Amendment supporters a sweeping victory by completely invalidating California’s 10-round limit on magazine capacity. “Individual liberty and freedom are not outmoded concepts,” he declared.
In a scholarly and comprehensive opinion, Judge Benitez subjected the ban both to the constitutional analysis he argued was required by the U.S. Supreme Court in District of Columbia v. Heller and a more complicated and flexible test the Ninth Circuit has applied in prior Second Amendment cases.
Either way, Judge Benitez ruled, the law would fail.
Indeed, he characterized the California law as “turning the Constitution upside down.”
How long has California been run by corrupt politicos and businessmen?
Eighty year is clearly enough!
He also systematically dismantled each of the state’s purported justifications for the law, demonstrating the factual and legal inconsistencies of their claims.
NRA-ILA Executive Director Chris W. Cox hailed the decision as a “huge win for gun owners” and a “landmark recognition of what courts have too often treated as a disfavored right.”
“Judge Benitez took the Second Amendment seriously and came to the conclusion required by the Constitution,” Cox said.
“The same should be true of any court analyzing a ban on a class of arms law-abiding Americans commonly possess for self-defense or other lawful purposes.”
Unfortunately, Friday’s opinion is not likely to be the last word on the case. The state will likely appeal to the Ninth Circuit, which has proven notably hostile to the Second Amendment in past decisions.
Nevertheless, the thoroughness of Judge Benitez’s analysis should give Second Amendment supporters the best possible chance for success in appellate proceedings, particularly if the case ultimately lands before the U.S. Supreme Court.
In the meantime, Friday’s order prohibits California from enforcing its magazine restrictions, leaving its law-abiding residents safer and freer, at least for the time being.
To stay up-to-date on the Duncan case and other important Second Amendment issues affecting California gun owners, visit https://www.nraila.org/campaigns/california/stand-and-fight-california/. And be sure to subscribe to NRA-ILA and CRPA email alerts by visiting https://www.nraila.org/sign-up and www.crpa.org.
H/T Fellowship of the Minds for the lead.
THE END
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