Liberal judge upholds Second Amendment rights

This week, in the Northern District of Illinois, U.S. District Court Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman (an Obama appointee) dismissed firearms possession charges against Heriberto Carbajal-Flores. Carbajal-Flores was arrested on June 1, 2020 in the Little Village, a Hispanic neighborhood on Chicago’s southwest side. This was during the heart of the COVID crisis, and only weeks earlier, peaceful protests had broken out in cities across the country as a result of George Floyd being killed in Minneapolis.

According to the ruling, “… Carbajal-Flores has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime, or a crime involving the use of a weapon. Even in the present case, Carbajal-Flores contends that he received and used the handgun solely for self-protection and protection of property during a time of documented civil unrest in the Spring of 2020.”

During that summer of pandemic and peaceful protests’ Americans purchased nearly 60 million guns. Gun stores could not keep guns or ammunition in stock, and approximately 7.5 million people bought a gun for the first time. As a gun owner and Second Amendment advocate, I was thrilled to see a liberal judge uphold the right to possess (carry) a handgun for self-defense.

So, why am I only clapping with one hand? The reason is that Heriberto Carbajal-Flores is an illegal alien. (I know it is not politically correct to say ‘illegal,’ but since President Biden referred to Laken Riley’s killer as an ‘illegal’ during an unscripted moment in his State of the Union address, it must be OK!) It is important to note that Carbajal-Flores was not charged in state court; rather, he was charged in federal court with violating 18 U.S.C. §922(g) (5). The statute reads, “It shall be unlawful for any person who, being an alien, is illegally or unlawfully in the United States to … possess … any firearm or ammunition …” The judge, in this case, essentially said that it is unconstitutional for the federal government to prevent illegal aliens from possessing guns!

The Second Amendment states, “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.”

I am not a lawyer, but the judge wrote, “… the Second Amendment's plain text presumptively protects firearms possession by undocumented people, …” From this premise, the ruling goes on to say that illegal immigrants, as a group, cannot be denied the right to possess firearms. The ruling further points out that since Carbajal-Flores has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime, or a gun crime, he cannot be “deprived of his Second Amendment right to bear arms in self-defense.”

I strongly disagree with this argument. In the landmark Second Amendment case District of Columbia v. Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court defined “the people” as “… all members of the political community.” Illegal immigrants are rightly excluded from that group. So, one hand is not clapping.

The other hand, however, is clapping! It is clapping because a liberal judge ruled that the “plain text of the Second Amendment presumptively protects firearms possession!” In Heller the court ruled that the right to keep and bear arms is an individual right. In another landmark case New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen the court ruled that the U.S. Constitution guarantees the right to carry a weapon in public.

As a conservative, I believe in states’ rights, but no state has the authority to undermine the freedoms guaranteed to the people by the Bill of Rights. This ruling was a bridge too far. As an illegal immigrant, Heriberto Carbajal-Flores should not have the right to possess a firearm in Chicago, but as an American citizen I should!

David Chung is a Gazette editorial fellow. david.chung@thegazette.com