When the Supreme Court issued its ruling in the Bruen case two years ago, striking down the "may issue" carry law in New York that required concealed carry applicants to prove a "justifiable need" to carry a firearm as a violation of the Second Amendment, both Kamala Harris and Joe Biden bizarrely declared the decision "defied common sense and the Constitution".

While Harris's declaration met with cheers from gun control activists, the Bruen decision itself has proved to be broadly popular with the electorate. Marquette University Law School has done multiple polls on the Bruen decision over the past two years and found majority support each and every time. In fact, the decision is growing more popular as time goes on. 

In its poll conducted in September 2022, just a few months after the decision was released, 56% of respondents supported SCOTUS, while 44% disagreed with the decision. By February of this year, support had reached 64%, and in August, Marquette Law's poll found 69% of respondents agreed with the Bruen decision. 

Now Marquette Law has once again asked respondents what they think about the Bruen decision, and support has ticked up once again. According to the law school, 70% of respondents agree that the Second Amendment protects the right to possess a firearm outside the home, with just 30% disagreeing. 

As the Firearm Policy Coalition pointed out on X, the poll found majority support for Bruen in almost every demographic that was surveyed. 

The Bruen decision is supported by:

71% of adults age 18-29
54% of independents
51% of Democrats
47% of people who are "very liberal"
73% of those registered to vote pic.twitter.com/NMpRT53n1P

— Firearms Policy Coalition (@gunpolicy) October 17, 2024

If 73% of registered voters disagree with Kamala Harris on a position, it should be a no-brainer for the Trump campaign to highlight Harris's views and contrast them with Trump's own take. After all, the Bruen case would likely have turned out very differently if Hillary Clinton had been elected in 2016 and had the opportunity to appoint three Supreme Court justices instead of Trump naming Neil Gorsuch, Brett Kavanaugh, and Amy Coney Barrett to the bench.

Given the unpopularity of other SCOTUS decisions, including Dobbs (which was supported by just 37% of those who took part in Marquette Law's most recent poll), the Trump campaign might not want to focus their arguments on the justices who ruled against New York's "may issue" law, but Trump could still bring up the right to carry in the closing weeks of the campaign by highlighting Harris's belief that you should have to prove a "need" to carry before exercising your Second Amendment rights, as well as Tim Walz's opposition to right-to-carry reciprocity. 

Under the "may issue" laws supported by Harris, licensing authorities across the country engaged in corrupt pay-to-play practices that deprived everyday citizens of their right to carry a firearm in self-defense while granting licenses to those who were willing to pay handsomely for the privilege. The NYPD Licensing Bureau was a "bribery machine", according to one former supervisor in the unit, who detailed in 2018 the cash and goods he and other licensing officers received from "expediters" in exchange for approving rarely-issued carry permits. And in Santa Clara County, California, former sheriff Laurie Smith was convicted on corruption charges in a civil trial for approving permits after sizeable donations were made to the sheriff's office and a group supporting her re-election efforts, even as those who could document ongoing threats to their life had their applications "placed in a file cabinet" and ignored.  

The "may issue" practices that Harris finds so appealing encourage graft and corruption, and Trump could easily (and rightfully) tie this issue to draining the D.C. swamp of unelected bureaucrats and public officials who abuse their authority to stifle our freedoms and civil rights. Harris is out of step with most voters when it comes to the Bruen decision, and it would be a major mistake for Trump or his campaign handlers to leave the issue aside in the final days of his campaign.