Thread by @mkolken

"People have heard about Uvalde, Texas. They have heard about Sandy Hook, Parkland, the Pulse nightclub, and other tragic mass shootings. But they do not hear of the AR-15 used in Florida by a pregnant wife and mother to defend her family from two armed, hooded, and masked home intruders."

"As soon as the armed intruders entered the back door of her home they pistol-whipped her husband -- fracturing his eye socket and sinus cavity. Then they grabbed the 11-year old daughter. The pregnant wife and mother was able to retrieve the family AR-15 from a bedroom and fire, killing one of the attackers while the other fled."

"It does not require much imagination to think what would have happened next if the woman had lived in California and could not possess such a firearm."

"People do not remember the disabled 61 year-old man living alone on a 20-acre property in Florida with dense woods and a long dirt driveway. After the homeowner had gone to bed, three men armed with a shotgun, pistol, and BB gun invaded. One wore a 'Jason' hockey mask."

"The disabled victim said he was awakened by a loud noise and grabbed the AR-15 laying near his bed. He saw the masked man and a second man coming toward him inside his home. Gunfire was exchanged. By the time police arrived, one attacker had run away, one lay wounded outside, and one was dead on the dining room floor."

"Police found the disabled man in his bedroom alive, but bleeding from a gunshot wound to the stomach. The AR-15 lay across his legs. Without his modern rifle, the victim would have become an evidence tag and a forgotten statistic."

"People do not hear about the AR-15 used by a young man in Oklahoma to defend himself from three masked and armed home invaders clothed in black. The three intruders broke through a rear glass door. Though outnumbered, the homeowner put up a successful defense with his AR-15."

"People do not hear about the AR-15 that was needed when seven armed and masked men burst through a front door at 4:00 a.m. firing a gun. Outnumbered seven to one, it took the resident 30 rounds from his AR-15 to stop the attackers."

"The Department of Justice reports that in the year 2021, in the entire country 447 people were killed with rifles (of all types). From this one can say that, based on a national population of 320 million people in the United States, rifles of any kind (including AR-15s) were used in homicides only 0.0000014% of the time."

"Put differently, if 447 rifles were used to commit 447 homicides and every rifle-related homicide involved an AR-15, it would mean that of the approximately 24,400,000 AR-15s in the national stock, less than .00001832% were used in homicides. It begs the question: what were the other AR-15 type rifles used for? The only logical answer is that 24,399,553 (or 99.999985%) of AR-15s were used for lawful purposes."

"We hear constantly about mass shootings for days and weeks and on anniversaries. But how often do we celebrate the saving of the life of Jane Doe because she was able to use a semi-automatic weapon to defend herself and her family from attackers? Are the lives of Jane, John, and Junior Doe worth any less than others? Are they less important?"

"In any event, the arms the State bans as 'assault weapons' are no more dangerous than other arms the State does not ban. The banned arms are just modern versions of rifles, shotguns, and pistols. For example, a Springfield 1911 pistol with a threaded barrel is an 'assault weapon,' according to California law. The same 1911 pistol (standard issue for the United States military for decades) without a threaded barrel, is fine. An AR-15 with normal parts is banned, but the same AR-15 with an awkward shark fin grip, an unmovable stock, and a barrel compensator in place of a flash hider, shooting the same ammunition, is fine."

"Like a cut diamond, the uniquely American right to keep and bear arms is multi-faceted. The unalienable right to have firearms for self-defense existed before the Bill of Rights and today remains the central protection of the Second Amendment. It is a right that was recognized in English common law and in the American colonies."

"There is a corollary right, perhaps important in the future and unquestioned at the time of the founding, to have firearms useful to bring to militia service. United States v. Miller held that sawed-off shotguns were not protected because there was no evidence that they were useful for military purposes."

"The obvious corollary was that weapons that could be useful for military purposes would be protected by the Second Amendment." Miller v. Bonta (2023)

"Unless the Supreme Court clearly says otherwise, commonly owned weapons that may be useful for war and are reasonably related to militia use are also fully protected, so long as they are not useful solely for military purposes. Modern semiautomatic rifles, shotguns, and pistols are such reasonably-related arms. " Miller v. Bonta (2023)