The US Supreme Court will decide whether a federal law prevents Mexico from suing gun distributors for allegedly facilitating the flow of firearms to drug cartels.
The high court on Friday granted the request by Smith & Wesson and other gun manufacturers to review a federal appeals court ruling reviving the case, after a trial judge threw it out on the basis of the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, a law that generally bars civil liability for firearm manufacturers and distributors for the use of their products by third-party criminals.
The Supreme Court granted 13 cases on Friday, filling out the term that will begin on Monday with new disputes dealing with reverse discrimination, the storage of spent nuclear fuel and DNA testing for a death row inmate. The court had already agreed to hear cases on President Joe Biden’s regulation of “ghost guns” and vaping.
The court will reconvene for the first time since its 6-3 conservative majority granted sweeping criminal immunity to former President Donald Trump in July, further limited the power of federal agencies and struck down a ban on bump stocks.
Mexico says gunmakers are reckless
In its lawsuit, Mexico alleged the manufacturers and distributors were aiding and abetting the purchase of their firearms by dealers known to supply drug cartels. They also claim that firearm makers have resisted making changes to their products – such as making gun serial numbers harder to tamper with or installing certain technological safeguards that would hinder a gun’s unauthorized use – that would make the guns less appealing to criminal gangs.
And the complaint says manufacturers market their products in a “inflammatory” and “reckless” way that makes guns more attractive to cartels.
At the heart of the dispute before the Supreme Court is the 2005 federal law passed by a GOP-led Congress. The ruling in Mexico’s favor came after gunmakers had previous success in using the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act to stop similar lawsuits from local and state governments.
The 1st Circuit concluded the Mexico lawsuit could go forward because it fell under an exemption allowing liability when the alleged harm is connected to violations by the gun maker or distributor of state or local law.
In seeking to have that ruling overturn, the manufacturers are contesting Mexico’s allegations that they were aiding and abetting the illegal sales of their arms in violation of federal law. They point to the Supreme Court’s 2023 ruling shielding Twitter from a lawsuit alleging it aided and abetted terrorism by hosting tweets created by the terror group ISIS.
Lawyers for Mexico, which asked the court not to disturb the 1st Circuit’s ruling, defended the ruling’s rationale and argued that it was premature for the Supreme Court to take up the case.
