SCOTUS Refuses Missouri Bid To Revive Law Negating Federal Gun Limits
The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear Missouri’s appeal seeking to reinstate its Second Amendment Preservation Act (SAPA) — a 2021 Republican-backed law that aimed to block state and local officials from enforcing federal gun regulations.
The Court’s decision leaves in place lower court rulings that struck down the measure as unconstitutional under the Supremacy Clause, which holds that federal law supersedes conflicting state law.
Missouri’s SAPA, passed by the GOP-led legislature and signed by then-Gov. Mike Parson in 2021, declared that several federal firearms restrictions violated the Second Amendment. The law threatened fines of up to $50,000 against state or local officials who helped enforce such federal rules — though it didn’t specify exactly which laws were considered invalid.
The Biden Justice Department sued Missouri in 2022, arguing that the state statute illegally interfered with federal authority. U.S. District Judge Brian Wimes, an Obama appointee, struck down the law in 2023, and the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld his ruling in 2024.
Missouri appealed to the Supreme Court on January 23, 2025 — just three days after President Donald J. Trump returned to office and reinstated a Justice Department that broadly supports Second Amendment protections.
However, in a surprising move, Trump’s DOJ urged the justices not to take up the case, arguing that while the administration considers parts of Missouri’s statute defensible, it agreed that Supreme Court review was unnecessary. The department indicated it would allow Missouri to seek a narrower ruling from Judge Wimes instead.
The Second Amendment Preservation Act sought to nullify any federal actions “forbidding the possession, ownership, use or transfer of a firearm, firearm accessory or ammunition by law-abiding citizens,” or any attempt to “confiscate” such items. The statute, however, left the definition of “law-abiding” unclear — a key factor courts cited in striking it down.
Federal officials said the law caused confusion and hesitation among Missouri law enforcement agencies, with some departments halting cooperation in joint federal firearms investigations.
Despite the Supreme Court’s refusal to take the case, Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey vowed to continue defending the state’s right to protect gun owners from what he called “federal overreach.”
“The people of Missouri have made it clear: the right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed,” Bailey said. “We will continue fighting to ensure that Washington bureaucrats cannot trample on that right.”
The ruling comes amid ongoing legal battles over gun rights nationwide. The Supreme Court, under its current conservative majority, has issued several landmark pro-Second Amendment decisions in recent years — including the 2008 Heller ruling affirming the right to possess firearms for self-defense and the 2022 Bruen decision protecting the right to carry a handgun in public.
Though Monday’s order does not signal a shift in the Court’s broader pro-gun jurisprudence, it highlights the complex balance between state sovereignty and federal supremacy — especially as red states continue to challenge Washington’s reach on gun policy.