GIFFORDS, Brady Urge SCOTUS to Protect Effectiveness of Life-Saving Brady Background Check System on Public Safety

Today, in a joint amicus brief in United States v. Hemani, Brady and GIFFORDS Law Center urged the Supreme Court of the United States to follow our nation’s history and tradition that allow the modern Brady Background Check System to effectively reduce firearm violence and protect public safety interests by prohibiting certain categories of people from accessing firearms. 

To make determinations on a case-by-case basis would involve taking account of judicial opinions, court orders, and other law enforcement materials – untenable for a system that, in 2024 alone, involved more than 28 million background checks, or almost 77,000 per day. Since the Brady Background Check requirement was adopted, more than 5.1 million people who are legally prohibited from possessing a gun have been either prevented from purchasing a gun or denied a permit to purchase one.

“Since the Founding, legislatures have exercised their power to protect against potential threats to public safety by restricting certain categories of people from accessing firearms. Courts have routinely upheld these categorical restrictions, recognizing that the individual right to bear arms is not absolute and that these reasonable public safety regulations are entirely consistent with this Nation’s historical regulatory tradition. 

“Such prohibitions serve important purposes in the broader framework of modern gun safety regulations. Through enacting categorical prohibitions, legislatures provide clear lines to effectively mitigate potential risks. And today’s regulatory systems, such as the federal Brady background check system, depend on these prohibitions for clear and timely determinations on firearm eligibility. Were the background check system to be compromised—as it would be without categorical prohibitions—more individuals who should not be permitted to possess firearms would be given access to them, a demonstrated direct threat to public safety. In resolving this appeal, the Court need not, and should not, call into question the centuries-old national practice of allowing legislatures to enact such prohibitions and regulators to rely on them to advance public safety.”

Click here for the full joint amicus brief.