Gun owners fighting Cook County, Illinois, over its AR-15 ban will have the U.S. government arguing on their side when the Supreme Court hears their case on Wednesday, December 2.
Story Highlights
- A Chicago gun owner and two national gun rights groups are asking the Court to strike down Cook County’s ban on AR-15-style rifles.
- The county’s law makes it a crime to own any of 125 named rifles, including the AR-15.
- The Court will let the Justice Department argue beside the gun owners for 10 minutes.
- Cook County wants its case dropped after one of the original gun owners asked to leave it.
- The county says the remaining gun owner can’t sue because he wants a Galil rifle, not an AR-15; the gun groups say the county’s own ban covers the Galil.
Ordinary Gun Owners Take On a County Ban
The case is called Viramontes v. Cook County. On Monday, November 9, the Supreme Court gave President Trump’s Justice Department permission to join the gun owners at oral argument. The Justice Department says Cook County’s ban violates the Second Amendment because it outlaws a rifle that millions of law-abiding Americans own for lawful reasons. The case began in 2021, when two Cook County residents, Cutberto Viramontes and Christopher Khaya, sued along with the Firearms Policy Coalition and the Second Amendment Foundation, two national gun rights groups.
They lost in the lower courts. A federal judge in Chicago ruled against them in 2024, and the federal appeals court in Chicago agreed in 2025, pointing to its own earlier rulings that upheld bans like this one. The gun owners then asked the Supreme Court to step in. In June, the Justices agreed to hear the case, limited to “AR-15 platform and similar semiautomatic rifles.” They joined it with Grant v. Higgins, a challenge to a Connecticut ban passed after the Sandy Hook school shooting.
What the Ban Covers
Cook County’s law is called the Blair Holt Assault Weapons Ban. It is named for a Chicago teenager killed in a 2007 shooting. The county first passed a version in 1993 and has changed it since. The law bars people from owning, buying or transferring 125 named rifles, the AR-15 among them, and it makes possessing one a crime.
For an ordinary gun owner in the Chicago area, that means a rifle sold legally in most of the country is off limits at home. According to the Justice Department, the AR-15 is legal under federal law and in 40 states, while ten states and the District of Columbia ban it. Khaya, a Chicago resident, says he wants to own an IMI Galil, a rifle the gun owners say the county’s law bars him from buying. The gun owners say a win could also topple similar bans elsewhere, including Illinois’ statewide ban.
Washington Steps In on Their Side
The Monday, November 9 order lets Solicitor General D. John Sauer, the lawyer who argues for the United States before the Supreme Court, speak as a “friend of the court.” That means he is not part of the lawsuit but can argue his view. Under the plan he proposed, the gun owners get 20 minutes, the United States gets 10 and the governments defending the bans get 30.
In a written brief filed in September, the government argued, “Legislatures may not ban arms in common use among law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes.” It called the AR-15 “the most popular rifle in the country” and cited estimates that at least 16 million Americans own one. The order is permission to argue, not a ruling on the ban.
A Twist Before Argument Day
On Thursday, October 29, the gun owners’ lawyers asked the Court to drop Viramontes, 36, from the case. The filing gave no reason, and Viramontes declined to comment when reached by reporters. Attorney David H. Thompson wrote that “this case remains pending as to all other petitioners.”
Cook County seized on the move. On Thursday, November 5, it told the Court the case may be moot, meaning there is no live dispute left to decide. The county says Khaya wants a Galil rather than an AR-15, so he lacks standing, the right to sue that comes from being personally harmed. The two gun rights groups say the county’s own ban covers the Galil. “Gun owners shouldn’t worry,” the National Association for Gun Rights posted online, noting Viramontes was “one of several individuals and organizations behind this challenge.” The Court has not ruled on the county’s request.
What the County Says
Cook County State’s Attorney Eileen O’Neill Burke, the county’s top prosecutor, calls AR-15-style rifles “offensive weapons of war designed for maximum lethality” that are not commonly used for self-defense. Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul and other state attorneys general argue that governments have long regulated unusually dangerous weapons to protect the public. The City of Chicago leads a coalition backing the ban.
Argument Day
On Wednesday, December 2, the Justices will hear from the gun owners, the federal government and the officials defending the bans. For millions of Americans who own an AR-15, the case asks a plain question: can a county make that rifle a crime to keep at home? With the United States arguing beside them, the gun owners from Cook County will not make their case alone.
Sources:
supremecourt.gov, supremecourt.report, justice.gov, cities929.com, cookcountystatesattorney.org, illinoisattorneygeneral.gov, chicago.gov