Federal Judge Rules Illegal Aliens can Own Guns

U.S. District Judge Sharon Johnson Coleman ruled earlier this month that an illegal alien can not be charged for carrying a loaded firearm. What can go wrong?

Judge Coleman is an Obama appointee and a liberal judge in Illinois. An illegal alien, Heriberto Carbajal-Flores, was charged with carrying a loaded gun. In her ruling, Judge Coleman said, ‘The noncitizen possession statute, 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5), violates the Second Amendment as applied to Carbajal-Flores.’Thus, the court grants Carbajal-Flores’ motion to dismiss.’

Carbajal-Flores’ defense team posed the argument that the government could not show that 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(5) was ‘part of the historical tradition that delimits the outer bounds of the right to keep and bear arms.’

In 2022, the Supreme Court ruled that government prosecutors must be able to show that regulations are ‘consistent with this nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.’

The arguments presented by defense lawyers were enough to convince the judge that the charges should be dismissed. She referred to him as a “noncitizen” and nothing else. She said she shies away from harsher language. Really? The term used in the Constitution is illegal alien. Does that offend her delicate sensibilities? 

‘Lifetime disarmament of an individual based on alienage or nationality alone does not have roots in the history and tradition of the United States,’ said attorneys for Carbajal-Flores. 

‘The court notes, however, that Carbajal-Flores has never been convicted of a felony, a violent crime, or a crime involving the use of a weapon,’ she wrote.

‘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,’ she added, likely referring to the riots that swept the country in the wake of the killing of George Floyd.

Some Second Amendment supporters say “the people” referred to by the Framers include those people here illegally. This is something I can’t wrap my head around. Why are illegal aliens given the same rights as legal citizens? It’s crazy. There are enough carrots and few sticks in the Biden administration’s handling of the southern border. 

Heriberto Carbajal-Flores was illegally in the United States when he possessed a handgun in the Little Village neighborhood of Chicago on June 1, 2020. He was charged under Title 18 of the U.S. Criminal Code. That legally stops illegal aliens from possessing firearms and ammunition “or to receive any firearm or ammunition which has been shipped or transported in interstate or foreign commerce.”

 It was an eight-page ruling. The judge noted that he adhered to and fulfilled the stipulated conditions of his release. He is employed and has not had any other arrests or outstanding warrants.

The court previously denied two motions by Carbajal-Flores to dismiss charges. The first time was on April 13, 2022, and the second on December 19, 2022—about six months after the U.S. Supreme Court voted 6-3 to strike down a 100-year-old New York law requiring that individuals show “proper cause” to get a license to carry a firearm outside a home, stemming from the 2022 ruling in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association, Inc. et al v. Bruen, Superintendent of New York State Police, et al.

That ruling was brought to the higher court after being challenged by the New York State Rifle & Pistol Association and gun owners Brandon Koch and Robert Nash.

“We hold that when the Second Amendment’s plain text covers an individual’s conduct, the Constitution presumptively protects that conduct,” Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in the court’s majority opinion. “To justify its regulation, the government may not simply posit that the regulation promotes an important interest. Rather, the government must demonstrate that the regulation is consistent with this nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation.”

The Supreme Court ruled in favor of gun control advocates in Illinois in May 2023 when it denied a request for an emergency injunction against the state’s ban on the sale and new possession of semiautomatic firearms.

“Those who are here illegally cannot possess a firearm of any kind that is obtained in illegal fashion,” political commentator Jay Oliver told Newsweek via email. “There is a civil duty of gun shop owners, if by that route, to lawfully indemnify those who are trying to obtain weaponry of choice by cutting corners.

“Unfortunately, we have seen too many trends where innocent lives are being lost based on upon the progressive nature of those in charge of courts and opinions.”

This feels like an upside-down world to me. Governor Pritzker is a gun-grabbing progressive who signed legislation enacting a statewide ban on ‘assault-style’ weapons. That included limits on magazine capacities, too. Yet, a federal judge in Illinois wants to arm illegal aliens. He is in the United States illegally, though Illinois is a sanctuary state. Nonetheless, once a firearm was brought into the picture, why wasn’t he deported? None of this makes sense to me.