WASHINGTON, D.C. (August 28, 2025) – Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) today announced that it has petitioned the United States Supreme Court in Viramontes v. Cook County, Illinois, seeking to overturn Cook County’s unconstitutional ban on commonly owned semiautomatic rifles.
“This case is the ideal vehicle for the Supreme Court to say—once and for all—that semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15 are protected by the Constitution,” said FPC President Brandon Combs. “The stakes could not be higher: If the Second Amendment doesn’t cover the most popular rifles in America, then it covers virtually nothing at all.”
Combs went on, “The Supreme Court must end this lawless two-step where politicians ban arms they dislike and judges pretend that’s constitutional to rubber-stamp their policy preferences. The AR-15 is the most popular rifle in America, owned by millions of peaceable people for lawful purposes every day. The Bill of Rights is not a suggestion, and the Second Amendment is not a second-class right. It’s time for the Court to make that unmistakably clear to the lower courts.”
“The issue raised by this case is exceptionally important,” the petition argues. “The AR-15 platform rifle is the most popular rifle in the country, and modern semiautomatic rifles like the AR-15 are the second-best selling type of firearm in the country behind only semiautomatic handguns.”
Indeed, the petitioners argue in the filing, it is “hard to imagine a court of appeals treating any other provision of the Bill of Rights this way. If the Second Amendment is not to be relegated to second-class status, and if it truly is intended to elevate above all other interests the right of law-abiding, responsible citizens to use arms for self-defense, then the decision below must be overturned.”
The petition and other key case documents can be viewed at firearmspolicy.org/viramontes. FPC is joined in this litigation by two individual FPC members and the Second Amendment Foundation. Plaintiffs are represented by David H. Thompson, Peter A. Patterson, and William Bergstrom of Cooper & Kirk, PLLC. FPC thanks FPC Action Foundation for its strategic support of this FPC Law case.
About Firearms Policy Coalition
Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC)—a 501(c)(4) nonprofit membership organization—exists to create a world of maximal individual liberty, defend constitutional rights, and restore the freedoms guaranteed by the Constitution. FPC pursues these goals through strategic litigation, legal scholarship, amicus briefing, legislative and regulatory advocacy, grassroots activism, education, and outreach. FPC’s legal arm, FPC Law, is the nation’s leading initiative dedicated to restoring the right to keep and bear arms across the United States. To learn more about FPC’s lawsuits and pro–Second Amendment efforts, sign up for FPC news alerts at firearmspolicy.org and follow FPC on X, Instagram, and Facebook.
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