The TL;DR version: We lose. For now. But frankly, this half-assed analysis used by Frank Easterbrook and Amy St. Eve may well help in the US Supreme Court’s analysis in the upcoming Viramontes case that SCOTUS accepted all of ten days ago.
My hot take is that Easterbrook wanted to release this and retain some relevance in the short term, even though he knows he’s going to get spanked by the US Supreme Court come next year.
Here’s the AI analysis of the 95 page opinion. If you’re going to read anything, skip to Brennan’s dissent on page 45.
Summary of the 7th Circuit Opinion (Barnett v. Raoul, decided July 9, 2026)
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit (St. Eve, J., joined by Easterbrook, F.) reversed the district court’s permanent injunction against Illinois’ Protect Illinois Communities Act (Pub. Act 102-1116, 2023). The Act bans the manufacture, sale, delivery, purchase, and possession of “assault weapons” (including semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15 with certain features or on a prohibited list) and “large-capacity ammunition feeding devices” (magazines holding more than 10 rounds for long guns or 15 for handguns), with grandfather clauses for pre-existing lawful owners via registration or affidavit.
[Brennan dissented with a well-written dissent.]
The court first rejected the plaintiffs’ facial challenges. Because not every item regulated by the Act (e.g., grenade launchers or certain belt-fed weapons) qualifies as a protected “Arm,” the plaintiffs could not show the provisions were unconstitutional in all applications. The court narrowed its analysis to AR-15-style rifles and 30-round magazines—the items on which the parties principally focused and for which a full record existed—while leaving other provisions (pistols, shotguns, etc.) for as-applied challenges.
Assuming without deciding that these items are “Arms” under Bruen step one (following the panel’s earlier Bevis v. City of Naperville decision), the court held that the restrictions satisfy Bruen step two. Legislatures have long regulated “particularly dangerous” weapons. The court identified 19th-century Bowie knife laws (carry bans, concealed-carry prohibitions, sales taxes/bans) as key analogues. These were upheld by state courts as targeting weapons that were “exceedingly destructive” and “instruments of almost certain death,” while leaving other arms available. The modern Act operates similarly: it imposes targeted, categorical restrictions (with exceptions for law enforcement/military) that burden the right to armed self-defense only modestly. Evidence showed rifles are used in only ~4% of defensive gun uses and firing more than 10 rounds is “extremely rare.” The burden is therefore comparable to historical restrictions.
The court reversed the district court’s contrary factual and legal conclusions on these points and upheld the Act as applied to AR-15s and 30-round rifle magazines.
Likely SCOTUS Treatment (Fall 2026 Cases + Wolford Context)
SCOTUS granted certiorari in Viramontes v. Cook County (7th Circuit, Cook County assault-weapon ban, explicitly relying on Bevis) and Grant v. Higgins (Connecticut assault-weapon ban). These will be argued in fall 2026 and directly implicate the core reasoning of Barnett/Bevis. The Court is also considering (or has pending petitions on) large-capacity magazine bans.
Barnett is vulnerable for several reasons tied to the Court’s evolving Bruen jurisprudence, most recently restated in Wolford v. Lopez (June 25, 2026). In Wolford (6-3, Alito, J.), the Court struck down Hawaii’s default no-carry rule on private property open to the public. The majority reaffirmed Bruen’s two-step framework but emphasized that the key inquiry at step two is whether the modern law is “consistent with the principles that underpin our regulatory tradition,” not a hunt for identical historical twins. Relevant similarity turns on “how” and “why” the regulation burdens the right (number of jurisdictions, acceptance, and comparability of burden and justification). The Court rejected overly rigid or atextual applications.
Justice Barrett’s concurrence (joined by Thomas and Gorsuch on key parts) and the dissents (Kagan; Jackson, joined by Sotomayor) underscore ongoing tensions: the majority stressed disciplined historical analysis focused on principles, while dissents argued the law fit traditional property/consent rules and accused the majority of misapplying Bruen.
Barnett is likely to be criticized or reversed because:
- It leans heavily on the Bevis “not really an Arm / military-like” distinction from Heller. SCOTUS has signaled (via Kavanaugh statements and grants) skepticism toward categorical exclusions for common semiautomatic rifles owned by millions for lawful purposes.
- Its historical analysis (Bowie knives as the leading analogue) may be viewed as insufficiently “relevantly similar” under the Wolford/Rahimi “how and why” test. Bowie knives were regulated differently (often public carry or sales taxes) and were not in the same category of ubiquitous, modern sporting/self-defense arms as AR-15s. Rarity-of-use data for self-defense may be seen as improperly injecting means-end balancing that Bruen rejected.
- The facial-challenge narrowing and assumption of step-one coverage may not satisfy a Court that prefers clear textual/historical lines. Other circuits (e.g., 2nd Circuit on Connecticut) upheld bans on “dangerous and unusual” grounds but with different reasoning; SCOTUS will likely seek uniformity.
- Wolford’s emphasis on principles (rather than exact matches) and the dissents’ pushback suggest the Court is policing both under- and over-application of Bruen. A 7th Circuit opinion that downplays the common-use/self-defense aspects of AR-15s while relying on 19th-century knife laws risks being seen as result-oriented or insufficiently rigorous.
Overall, Barnett strengthens the hand of states defending bans in the short term but provides a roadmap for SCOTUS to narrow or strike down broad assault-weapon restrictions when it decides the fall cases. The Court appears poised to clarify that common semiautomatic rifles are protected “Arms” and that historical analogues must be more closely tailored than the 7th Circuit’s approach allows.