The gun control movement was founded on the idea of banning the sale and possession of handguns, but that dystopian dream seemed to have died after the Supreme Court struck down Washington, D.C.'s handgun ban in the Heller case and disposed of Chicago's ban two years later in McDonald. Bans on entire classes of firearms violated the Second Amendment, said the Court, and in the years since anti-gun activists have largely shifted their prohibitionist impulses to target semi-automatic long guns and any other firearm they deem to be an "assault weapon." 

Now, however, the gun control lobby has a new strategy to target pistols. On the heels of multiple lawsuits filed against gunmaker Glock that seek to stop the sale of its products because they can be illegally modified to become full-auto, a Maryland lawmaker has introduced a legislation that would not only prohibit the sale and purchase of Glocks throughout the state, but any and all semi-automatic pistols that can be illegally converted to full-auto through the use of a switch and/or auto-sear. 

Existing prohibitions on bump stocks, binary and burst trigger systems, and other rapid-fire activators would remain under the measure. 

The proposal comes amid an ongoing grapple with gun violence in Maryland communities. 

Switches have been among recent discussions for Maryland leaders. In February, Maryland Attorney General Anthony Brown and Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott filed a lawsuit against major gun manufacturer Glock over allegations that the company violated the state's Gun Industry Accountability Act and contributed to the gun violence crisis. 

"Since 1990, Glock has manufactured a pistol that can easily be converted into a machine gun," Brown said.

Baltimore City Mayor Scott said the city has seen an increase in Glock switches that have been used to carry out criminal activity. 

Baltimore City Police Commissioner Richard Worley said recoveries of modified Glocks nearly doubled between 2023 and 2024. 

According to data from Baltimore Police, 35 Glock switches were recovered in Baltimore and 65 were recovered in 2024. 

The report by CBS News in Baltimore claims that the text of the bill includes a list of the specific firearms that would be banned under the proposal, but that's not entirely accurate. HB 1287 does contain an enumerated list of "assault pistols", but those are already prohibited under Maryland law, so there's nothing new there. Instead, it's the open-ended prohibition on any semi-auto handgun that can accept a switch or an auto sear that would be the big addition to the state's already draconian gun control regime. 

The bill was scheduled for its first hearing in the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday afternoon and could start moving towards the House floor in the very near future. HB 1287 already has 29 co-sponsors and will likely draw more support from Democrats along the way, so this is a very real threat to the Second Amendment rights of Maryland residents, who would be deprived of their ability to purchase some of the most popular and common handgun models in the country if the bill becomes law.

Would such a ban hold up in court? SCOTUS has already declared that arms that are in common use for lawful purposes are prima facie protected by the Second Amendment, which would most certainly include Glocks and other striker-fired handguns, but the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals has been pretty creative in upholding other Maryland gun control laws, including its ban on "assault weapons". In Snope v. Brown the appellate court held that semi-automatic rifles aren't protected by the Second Amendment because they're "like" machine guns, so it's not outside the realm of possibility that the Fourth Circuit would declare that guns that can be converted to full-auto also fall outside the scope of the Second Amendment. 

And if Maryland lawmakers are pushing this pistol ban, you better believe that other anti-gun states are soon to follow. More than fifteen years after the Supreme Court declared handgun bans unconstitutional, the anti-gunners think they've found a loophole, and handgun bans are back on the table in those states that are hostile to our Second Amendment rights.