The Supreme Court has placed Viramontes v. Cook County and Grant v. Higgins on its December 2 oral argument calendar — marking the first time the high court will hear direct challenges to so-called assault weapons bans — and the Trump administration has signaled it plans to use that platform to tell the justices that categorical bans on America's most popular rifle violate the Second Amendment. Solicitor General D. John Sauer filed an amicus brief in the consolidated cases and formally requested ten minutes of argument time before the Court, AmmoLand News reported this week.

The two cases arise from bans enacted in Illinois's Cook County and by the state of Connecticut, both of which prohibit possession of AR-15-platform and similar semiautomatic rifles. The question before the Court is whether the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect "the right to possess AR-15 platform and similar semiautomatic rifles." The government's brief argues that the AR-15 is "the quintessential example of an arm that is in common use among law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes," pointing to ownership data showing at least 16 million Americans own AR-15 rifles and more than 28 million AR-style rifles are in domestic circulation.

The cases reach the Court after a year of sharply divergent lower-court rulings. In July, the Seventh Circuit upheld Illinois's ban on AR-15-style rifles and standard-capacity magazines, reasoning that such firearms fall on the "military side" of a line it drew between civilian and military arms. Eight days later, the Third Circuit struck down New Jersey's equivalent law in a 10-to-5 en banc decision. That split made Supreme Court intervention close to certain. The Second Amendment Foundation and the Firearms Policy Coalition, which are among the lead petitioners, filed opening briefs in late August. The Gun Owners of America and other organizations have since submitted amicus briefs urging the Court to reject the Seventh Circuit framework entirely, arguing the civilian-versus-military distinction has no grounding in the text of the Second Amendment or in the Court's own precedents in District of Columbia v. Heller and New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen.

Solicitor General Sauer's move is significant. Federal amicus participation in a Second Amendment case at this level, supporting the gun-rights side, is a direct continuation of the Trump administration's posture under Attorney General Todd Blanche — one that gun rights advocates have credited for accelerating the legal environment that produced the Bruen decision in 2022. Shooting News Weekly reports that Sauer's office has asked for enough time to deliver a standalone argument, not merely a few minutes tacked onto the petitioners' share.

Oral argument is scheduled for one hour beginning at 10 a.m. on December 2. A ruling is expected before the end of the Court's term in June 2027. If the Court holds that the Second Amendment covers AR-15-pattern rifles — as both the government's brief and the petitioners argue — the decision would invalidate similar statutes in California, Maryland, Massachusetts, Hawaii, and other states that have enacted comparable restrictions on semiautomatic firearms. The outcome will also sharply shape lower-court litigation over so-called large-capacity magazine bans still working their way through several circuits.