Gun Group Sues Massachusetts To End Assault Weapons Ban

BOSTON, MA — An out-of-state gun advocacy group filed a lawsuit Thursday seeking to overturn an assault weapons law in Massachusetts, part of a volley of five lawsuits filed this week targeting states with gun safety laws.

The Washington, DC-based National Association for Gun Rights is citing a recent U.S. Supreme Court decision in its bid to overturn the Massachusetts assault weapons and extended magazine bans. The Bruen decision, handed down in June, struck down a New York state law that required residents to show cause for needing to carry a concealed gun in public.

"[W]e’re going after every Federal Circuit Court which has upheld egregious firearms bans. They must immediately overturn their ‘assault weapons’ and magazine bans — and our suits argue just that," National Association for Gun Rights President Dudley Brown said of the group's lawsuit against Massachusetts in the federal First Circuit Court.

Massachusetts enshrined an assault weapons ban in state law in 1998. The law bans weapons like the AK-47, and more broadly bans rifles with certain features, like having a grenade launcher or telescope stock. Massachusetts also restricts magazine capacity to 10 rounds.

Attorney General Maura Healey expanded on the ban in 2016 by issuing an enforcement notice that effectively banned the sale of AR-15 style rifles, the type of semiautomatic weapon often used in mass shootings, including the recent massacre of 19 children and two adults in Uvalde, Texas. The move classified certain semiautomatic weapons as "copies and duplicates" of prohibited weapons.

The National Association for Gun Rights is also suing Connecticut, Hawaii and two towns in Illinois — Naperville and Highland Park — to overturn similar gun controls. The lawsuits are part of an effort to "establish a national precedent permanently ending" assault weapons and magazine capacity bans, the state said.

Following the Bruen decision, state lawmakers approved a slew of changes to state gun laws — including requiring gun permit seekers to interview with local police, and prohibiting anyone with a harassment prevention order against them from getting a gun. The changes were made to strengthen state gun laws against legal challenges in the wake of Bruen.