Video News Clips: In Their Own Words

Alan Dershowitz Explains Why Supreme Court Ended Up Upholding Biden’s ‘Ghost Gun’ Crackdown

Screenshot/Rumble/The Dershow

Legal scholar Alan Dershowitz said Wednesday that the Supreme Court upheld a Biden administration regulation cracking down on so-called “ghost guns” because they were similar to certain restrictions on the First Amendment.

The Supreme Court upheld the regulations in a 7-2 decision, with Chief Justice John Roberts and Associate Justices Amy Coney Barrett, Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh joining the three left-wing justices to keep the regulations in place. Dershowitz said the Second Amendment “was not directly involved” in regulating the kits that allow people to make their own firearm in “half an hour.”

“So there are regulations of free speech, even though the Constitution says Congress shall make no law and there are regulations permitted for gun ownership and gun sale,” Dershowitz said. “So the question in this case was whether or not the regulation was intended to cover–the regulation which talks about regulating firearms and guns–does that include the components of guns, the kits? I would have thought that would be a pretty easy question, particularly since some of the kits basically take a half an hour to assemble.”

He continued, “[The Supreme Court] said that you can have regulations, you can prevent people from bringing guns into schools or into crowded areas or maybe into Times Square. Big disputes about all that, but the Supreme Court has so far said you can have some degree of regulation as you can with free speech. Free speech, it also says Congress shall make no law, doesn’t even give a real reason, just no law and, of course, Congress makes laws all the time regulating free speech. You can’t blast speakers into the night.”

“I had this myself on the beach down here in Florida. Just a few days ago, I was sitting on the beach reading and relaxing and this idiot sets up a–an enormous speaker system, like at a club right next to me, and starts blasting music into my ears and I went over and asked him could he just lower the volume? No, no, it’s my beach as much as much as yours, but there are regulations for time, place, and manner,” Dershowitz concluded.

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The Biden administration enacted the regulations in 2022, after a mass shooter killed 19 children and two teachers at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, Texas, before Border Patrol agents stormed the classroom and fatally shot him.

United States District Court Judge Reed O’Connor of the Northern District of Texas issued a preliminary ruling in September 2022 that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) likely usurped congressional authority, following it up with a ruling that the regulations exceeded ATF’s authority in June 2023. The Supreme Court took up the case in April 2024 on the merits after previously overturning injunctions issued by O’Connor.