The Supreme Court is set to consider whether the Second and 14th Amendments protect possession of AR-15-platform and similar semiautomatic rifles as it hears consolidated challenges to assault-weapon bans in Illinois and Connecticut. Oral argument in Viramontes v. Cook County is scheduled for Dec. 2, 2026, according to SCOTUSblog. The NYPD has entered the dispute on the bans’ side, arguing that allowing such rifles in public would pose particular dangers for officers.
The case began with Cook County residents and gun-rights organizations challenging restrictions on semiautomatic rifles. A federal district court ruled for the county in 2024, and the Seventh Circuit affirmed in 2025, amNewYork reported. The Supreme Court later combined that case with a challenge to Connecticut’s ban, enacted after the 2012 Sandy Hook shooting.
The NYPD’s argument: the risks of a street encounter
In its filing, submitted on the department’s behalf by New York City Corporation Counsel Steven Banks, the NYPD says a report of someone openly carrying a rifle could force responding officers to decide quickly whether the person poses a threat. The department argues that this uncertainty can make an encounter more dangerous than a routine stop. Those are the NYPD’s claims about policing risks, not findings by the Supreme Court, according to amNewYork’s account of the brief.
The department also points to a mismatch between the rifles at issue and officers’ standard equipment: its filing says patrol officers carry 9mm handguns and wear vests designed for handgun rounds, not high-velocity rifle rounds. It argues that rifles would be harder to holster, could constrain officers’ less-lethal options and could increase pressure for further weapons changes. The filing also notes that police departments do not all share its view; some have argued that armed civilians could assist law enforcement, amNewYork reported.
A related ruling did not settle the question
A separate 2025 challenge to Maryland’s AR-15 ban offers a limited point of legal context. On June 2, 2025, the Supreme Court denied review in Snope v. Brown. Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote in a statement accompanying that denial that the Court’s decisions in Bruen and Rahimi had not disturbed the historically based “common use” test for particular weapons, according to the Supreme Court’s published statement. The Court did not rule on the Maryland ban’s constitutionality in that case, and the statement is not a decision on the merits of the Illinois and Connecticut challenges.
The NYPD’s filing advances an officer-safety argument within a broader constitutional dispute. The justices’ decision will address the challenged bans in Cook County and Connecticut; how it may affect other jurisdictions’ restrictions remains unresolved.
