“Hunter Biden pleaded not guilty to three firearms charges during his arraignment in a federal court in Delaware on Tuesday, amid a high-profile legal battle that has pit the president’s son against his Justice Department as the 2024 presidential campaign gets underway,” NBC News reports.
“[H]is attorney, indicated he intends to file multiple motions to dismiss the case and call for an evidentiary hearing tied to that effort,” Delaware Online elaborates. “One of those motions will focus on an agreement prosecutors previously struck with Hunter Biden that would have seen the government not prosecute the gun charges in exchange for the president’s son agreeing to abstain from drug use for two years and never again owning a firearm.”
Biden’s consent to be a prohibited person is the subject of a complaint filed by this correspondent against the Department of Justice after it failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act request seeking to determine the department’s statutory authority for unelected employees of the executive branch to effectively create a new classification of “prohibited person” that has not been authorized by Congress.
That dovetails with parallel efforts to determine the same authority – or lack thereof—in legal cases challenging rulemaking diktats on bump stocks, forced reset triggers, pistol stabilizing braces, and so-called “ghost gun” frames and receivers.
“Hunter Biden’s attorneys have told the court the diversion agreement is still in place, which will be the basis of one of Hunter Biden’s motions to toss the case,” Delaware Online continues. “[A]nother basis will center on the constitutionality of the gun charges. The specific law that Hunter Biden is charged with violating is primarily used to prevent felons from possessing a firearm but also contains provisions prohibiting gun possession for other reasons.”
Add to this a recent legal threat by special counsel Jack Smith against Donald Trump when he contended that a person under indictment holding a gun is prosecutable as “possession.”
Cases like these, a successful (so far) pushback against muzzling gunmakers, advancements against magazine bans (resulting in unprecedented legal contortions by the Ninth Circuit), and the Rahimi case challenging restraining orders on due process grounds, and recent actions on “sensitive places” gun bans, reflect a new legal landscape following the Supreme Court’s ruling in Bruen basing constitutional permissibility of gun laws on text, history, and tradition at the time the Constitution was written, debated and ratified.
The citizen disarmament house of cards — from the purpose behind Form 4473, the designation of “prohibited person,” and the entire rationale behind the “universal background checks” the Biden administration is making the centerpiece of its new Kamala Harris boondoggle (that should be called), the “Federal Office of Gun Violence Promotion,” along with bans on what you can own, where you can go, and what you can say — may be set to collapse, and “the Big Guy” may have a son who will do anything to save his own skin to thank for it.
It would also remove any further excuses ATF may throw out to try and avoid answering a resurrected FOIA request for documents on its Hunter Biden gun investigation, including identifying all the players involved.
Years ago, NRA’s Wayne LaPierre at his fawning and obsequious best, called Harry Reid “a true champion of the Second Amendment.” It would be satisfyingly ironic if that title ended up sarcastically falling on Hunter Biden by default.
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
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