Homeowner, shoots, kills male suspect inside South Side residence

CHICAGO (WLS) — A male home invader was shot and killed inside a residence on the South Side Monday morning, Chicago police said.

The shooting took place at about 1:30 a.m. in the 2200-block of East 103rd Street.

Officers responded to the scene and found a person shot in the chest and pronounced dead at the scene, police said.

A 33-year-old man inside the residence told officers that the unidentified person entered his home and charged in his direction, police said.

The man fired his gun and shot the home invader in the chest, police said.

Area Two detectives are investigating.

On this day in 1865, Robert E. Lee surrendered to Ulysses S. Grant.

Lee showed up dressed in his best, looking like a dignified gentleman. Grant was covered in mud after riding all morning.

Before anything was signed, the two men spoke about their shared service in the Mexican War — a reminder that Confederates and Union soldiers were nonetheless countrymen tied by mystic chords of memory.

Grant did not create terms of surrender to humiliate the South. Grant and Lincoln understood that to unify the nation, you could not imprison half of it. Confederates were allowed to keep their sidearms and personal horses.

When Grant learned that Lee’s men were quite literally starving after having not eaten for days, he ordered 25,000 rations sent to them immediately. Lee said this would have “a very happy effect” on his men.

When Lee rode away after signing terms of surrender, Union soldiers cheered. Grant forced them to stop, reminding Union soldiers that Confederates were “now our countrymen” and there would be no cheering over their downfall. (In fact, days later when actual ceremonial surrender occurred, Union Gen. Josh Chamberlain reportedly ordered his men to salute passing Confederates as a sign of respect)

Lee also worked diligently to stop Confederates from waging guerrilla warfare, encouraging them to set their arms aside and return home and in peace. He was a titan in his own right.

If the spirit of 1865 had been driven by the urge to shame and punish, the Union would not have lasted. So many people today misunderstand that and as such, they try to rewrite America history.

God Bless America.

Maine: Federal Appeals Court Upholds 3-Day Waiting Period Law For Firearm Purchases

A federal appeals court has ruled that Maine’s law requiring a three-day waiting period between firearm purchases and taking possession of a gun to be constitutional.

On April 3, a three-judge panel of the Boston-based 1st Circuit Court of Appeals reversed last year’s decision by Maine’s chief federal judge that blocked enforcement of the law on Second Amendment grounds. In a nutshell, the circuit court ruled that the law is a “burden on, but not an infringement of, the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.”

In what seems to be strained logic, the court ruled that the law regulates conduct before a person keeps and bears arms, thus not infringing upon actually keeping and bearing arms.

“We agree with the Attorney General’s view that laws regulating the purchase or acquisition of firearms do not target conduct covered by the Second Amendment’s ‘plain text,’” the court wrote in the case Beckwith v. Frey. “The Amendment’s plain text guarantees an individual’s ability to keep and bear arms, which means to have a carry guns. The Act does not address this conduct. Rather, the Act imposes a limitation in some circumstances on when a person can acquire a firearm after the person purchased it. The act thus regulates conduct that occurs before a person keeps or carries a gun.”

Of course, anti-gun supporters of the law cheered the court’s ruling as a major step for so-called “gun safety.” Continue reading “”

There Are No ‘Moderate’ Democrats When it Comes to Gun Rights.

Virginia’s Gov. Abigail Spanberger is determined to make her mark in the Old Dominion. She campaigned for office as a moderate Democrat, but Virginians are learning quickly that they’ve been hoodwinked. The reaction is astounding.

A recent poll conducted by George Mason University and The Washington Post found that Gov. Spanberger earned the highest disapproval rating from Virginians of any governor since 1994. Forty-six percent of Virginians disapprove of Gov. Spanberger’s job performance, just three months into the job. To put that into perspective, Gov. Spanberger won by 15 points in her race against former Lt. Gov. Winsome Earle-Sears. Her performance is also a glaring contrast to former Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin’s 53-39 job approval rating at the same point in his administration, according to Fox News.

Chief among those headwinds are two issues that the firearm industry is tracking very closely. First, Gov. Spanberger is expected to sign into law SB 749, which would unconstitutionally ban the purchase of Modern Sporting Rifles (MSRs), or the AR-15-style semiautomatic rifles — the most common rifle in America — as well as semiautomatic shotguns used for hunting and home defense and many pistols and standard capacity magazines. Gov. Spanberger is also considering a bill, HB21, that would attempt to circumvent the bipartisan Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA) to allow frivolous lawsuits against firearm industry members for the criminal misuse of firearms by remote third parties.

Add to that, Gov. Spanberger is backing a referendum effort to gerrymander the Congressional districts in Virginia that would bring a new hyper-partisan Virginia congressional delegation to Congress. If successful, it would change Virginia’s 11 Congressional districts that are currently comprised of six Democrats and five Republicans to 10 Democrats and just one Republican.

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Because it’s garbage.

Why is it That So Little of the ‘Science’ Around ‘Gun Violence’ Can be Replicated?

national homicide rate record low NY Times

Gun rights supporters know that civilian disarmament advocates have long employed dubious social “science”/public “health” research in their mission to strip Americans of their Second Amendment rights. Worse, these political actors insist that taxpayers fund these attacks.

Last week, NRA-ILA pointed to new research showing that the social “sciences” exhibit woeful, and increasing, political bias. Compounding this problem, this week, a large team of researchers published another study showing that roughly half of social “science” research can’t be replicated. Replication is vital to determining whether a study’s conclusions are in fact valid.

The item is titled Investigating the replicability of the social and behavioural sciences, and was published April 1 in the journal Nature. An article in the journal Science, titled Across the social sciences, half of research doesn’t replicate, summarized the findings.

Describing the replication research project, Science explained.

Called Systematizing Confidence in Open Research and Evidence (SCORE), the effort investigated more than 100 papers published in dozens of leading journals in business, economics, education, political science, psychology, and sociology. The replication success rate—49% for the 164 papers evaluated, reported today in Nature—is consistent with findings from previous studies in individual fields such as psychology, suggesting the problem is pervasive in the social sciences.

Citing a scientist interviewed for the piece, the Science item noted,

Improving repeatability requires reforms in professional evaluations and funding practices to incentivize researchers to prioritize rigor and quality over the quantity of papers they publish, Cobey says. “Answering the ongoing questions of the credibility of research requires a cultural change in how we conduct research.”

The problems highlighted by this research project will be familiar to those aware of a 2015 study published in Science that detailed the results of a four-year effort to improve the accuracy of psychological science. A team of 270 scientists led by University of Virginia Professor Brian Nosek attempted to replicate 98 studies published in some of psychology’s most prestigious journals by conducting 100 attempts at replication. In the end, according to a Science article accompanying the study, “only 39% of the studies could be replicated unambiguously.” The episode, in part, led to what has become known as the replication crisis.

These problems with social “science” research won’t come as a surprise to loyal readers of the NRA-ILA Grassroots Alert.

The dubious incentives are obvious. Today, much of the social “science”/public “health” field is concerned with empowering government to dictate an ever-expanding array of individual behavior, including what people can eat, drink, read, think, drive, and how to protect yourself and your family. The bulk of the project is fundamentally opposed to individual liberty. All the while, Americans are assured that it’s necessary for an ever-growing amount of taxpayer resources to be devoted to public health “experts” studying and implementing these efforts.

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Brown v. ATF: Gun Rights Groups Challenge NFA Registration After Tax Repeal

The Second Amendment Foundation, American Suppressor Association, National Rifle Association, and Firearms Policy Coalition filed a supplemental brief in Brown v. ATF challenging the constitutionality of the National Firearms Act’s remaining registration requirements now that President Donald Trump’s One Big Beautiful Bill eliminated the $200 tax on silencers, short-barreled rifles, short-barreled shotguns, and “any other weapons,” according to a press release from the organization.

Prior to the legislation’s enactment, acquiring these items under the NFA required both paying the tax and registering the firearms with the federal government. Congress grounded this regime in its constitutional taxing authority. The gun rights organizations contend that by zeroing out the tax, the One Big Beautiful Bill stripped Congress of its constitutional basis for keeping the registration requirement in place.

“In response to our Motion for Summary Judgment, the court requested additional briefing, which highlight multiple critical elements of our claim,” said SAF Director of Legal Operations Bill Sack. “We are thrilled to have an additional opportunity to explain exactly why our claim is so strong. The brief highlights why SAF and our members have standing to bring this suit, and precisely how the merits analysis supports our position. As we always do, we make our positions as plainly and forthrightly as possible, and we post links to the entire docket for each case on our website so everyone can read the full arguments we are making on their behalf.”

Brown v. ATF is being litigated in the United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri under case number 4:25-cv-01162-SRC. Plaintiffs include the Second Amendment Foundation, American Suppressor Association, National Rifle Association, Firearms Policy Coalition, Prime Protection STL Tactical Boutique, and two private citizens, Chris Brown and Allen Mayville. Named defendants are the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, Acting ATF Director Daniel P. Driscoll, the United States Department of Justice, and Attorney General Pamela J. Bondi.

The supplemental brief, filed March 31, 2026, argues that suppressors fall within the Second Amendment’s plain text as integral components of firearms that facilitate their use and functionality. Plaintiffs contend that suppressors qualify as “arms” under the Second Amendment, drawing on historical precedent and practical applications including their capacity to reduce noise, muzzle flash, and hearing damage in self-defense situations.

The brief further challenges the NFA’s characterization as a tax-and-registration regime rather than a licensing system, arguing that registration requirements are constitutionally suspect. Plaintiffs maintain that the NFA’s operation amounts to a registry of constitutionally protected arms, which conflicts with the Second Amendment’s text and historical tradition.

The plaintiffs seek to possess, acquire, or manufacture NFA-regulated firearms without registration, asserting that the NFA’s provisions inflict concrete, particularized injuries and create a credible threat of prosecution, as the defendants have not disclaimed intent to enforce the law against them.

“For almost a century, the NFA has been used to infringe on the Second Amendment rights of citizens,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “We now have a chance to remove these unconstitutional restrictions and look forward to fully restoring the right to keep and bear arms for the countless Americans who own silencers and short-barreled rifles across the nation.”

The NFA should be abolished entirely. Its passage in the 1930s represented an unconstitutional infringement on the right to bear arms and established the legal framework for every subsequent gun control measure that followed. Americans should not need government permission to exercise a constitutionally protected right, and courts should recognize the NFA for what it always was and strike it down completely.

The who, what, and where of gun control

A Second Opinion is a recurring series by Haley Proctor on the Second Amendment and constitutional litigation.

My previous column examined what it means for a gun control measure to fit within “the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.” This month I want to focus on how the court has analyzed gun regulations that limit (1) who may possess a firearm, (2) what arms people may own or carry, and (3) where they may take them.

Who may keep and bear arms?

As of writing, the court’s latest word on the Second Amendment concerns the “who” of gun control: may the government permissibly restrict the ability of certain types of people to keep and bear arms? The court provided important guidance on that question in the 2024 case of United States v. Rahimi, but significant questions remain open.

The Second Amendment secures to “the people” the right “to keep and bear Arms.” In District of Columbia v. Heller, the court held that “the people” refers “to all members of the political community, not an unspecified subset.” This means that the “plain text” contains no limitation on the right that would permit the government to deprive some category of persons of firearms without meeting its burden to show that the deprivation is consistent with the “Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”

The court has occasionally used the phrase “law-abiding, responsible citizens” to describe “the class of ordinary citizens who undoubtedly enjoy the Second Amendment right.” Some have inferred that this phrase limits the category of people who may assert a Second Amendment right. The court’s decision in Rahimi made clear that this reading was mistaken. If the government wishes to limit the ability of any “member[ ] of the political community” to keep or bear arms – even those who break the law or might be thought to be irresponsible – it must point to a historical tradition that justifies doing so.

Rahimi recognized a historical tradition that “allows the Government to disarm individuals who present a credible threat to the physical safety of others,” “temporarily.”  And it identified one group of individuals who the government may disarm consistent with that tradition: individuals presently under a restraining order issued upon a finding that the recipient poses “a credible threat to the physical safety” of another.

This term, the court has taken up the “who” question once more. The case of United States v. Hemani requires it to decide whether the same tradition permits the government to disarm individuals who unlawfully use drugs. Several additional “who” questions are in the offing.

First, despite Heller’s holding that the “people” includes “all members of the political community,” and despite the fact that 18-to-20 year-olds are undoubtedly part of the political community (and many shoulder the responsibility to bear arms for that community), some courts have continued to hold that they are not part of the “people” who enjoy a right to keep and bear arms. These courts have therefore rejected challenges to laws restricting adults’ ability to purchase or carry firearms until they reach the age of 21. There is a circuit split on this question, and the  court has been holding several petitions since November. It could be that the court plans to grant, vacate, and remand these cases in light of Hemani, but given that they focus on the meaning of “people” and a different aspect of the historical regulatory tradition, it’s doubtful that Hemani will supply much guidance.

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He can only be replaced with an equal for his rulings can hardly be bettered

‘Saint’ Benitez Steps Down From Bench

Almost 22 years after taking on the job, Roger T. Benitez has stepped down from his position as a U.S. district judge in California, much to the relief of anti-gunners like California Attorney General Rob Bonta and Gov. Gavin Newsom.

Benitez was deemed the patron saint of Cailfornia gun owners for his rulings recognizing the fundamental nature of our right to keep and bear arms, and was responsible for California’s “Freedom Week” in 2019. After Benitez ruled the state’s magazine ban a violation of the Second Amendment, he refused to stay his decision, and for seven glorious days California residents could once again legally purchase ammunition magazines that can hold more than ten rounds before the Ninth Circuit granted the state’s request to continue enforcing the law on magazine sales while the Duncan case was appealed.

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If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government that is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. — James Madison