Assistant Attorney General Harmeet K. Dhillon, who heads the DOJ's Civil Rights Division and oversees its Second Amendment Section, is reportedly leaving her position.
According to Fox News, Dhillon's resignation has already taken place, while Reuters reports her departure is "imminent." Either way, her exit could have a huge impact on the number of pattern and practice lawsuits that the Civil Rights Division has brought against state and local governments alleging violations of the Second Amendment.
So far there's no word if any of the attorneys in the Second Amendment Section will be departing as well. The chief of the division is attorney Barry Arrington, who worked extensively with National Association for Gun Rights before accepting a position at DOJ earlier this year. Second Amendment litigator Stephen Stamboulieh also joined the section in recent months, and if the one or both of these attorneys head for the exits as well it would leave an even bigger hole in the DOJ's efforts to defend the right to keep and bear arms.
The DOJ's Civil Rights Division never brought any legal challenges against gun control laws until Dhillon was appointed to lead it last year. It's unclear who Attorney General Todd Blanche will appoint to head up the division on an interim basis, but there's no guarantee they'll view Second Amendment litigation as a top priority, as Dhillon has done.
The DOJ currently has at least ten active lawsuits taking on various gun control laws, from licensing delays and sky-high carry permit fees in California to permit-to-purchase laws in Minnesota that impose a 30-to-60 day waiting period on the purchase of some firearms. Other lawsuits are challenging bans on commonly owned semi-automatic firearms and ammunition magazines in Colorado, Virginia, and Washington, D.C., as well as restrictions on handgun sales in California. The DOJ has also taken aim at carry restrictions in Maryland and licensing requirements in the U.S. Virgin Islands.
These cases aren't going to disappear just because Dhillon is departing. The Justice Department remains a party to the litigation, and the attorneys handling those lawsuits can continue their work... so long as they're sticking around. But there's a big difference between keeping existing cases alive and actively looking for new opportunities to challenge unconstitutional gun laws, and that's where Dhillon's departure could have the greatest impact, in my opinion.
Under her leadership, the Civil Rights Division has treated the right to keep and bear arms as a civil right deserving the same federal protection as freedom of speech, religious liberty, and the right to vote. That's been a dramatic departure from the department's previous approach, which largely left the task of challenging gun control laws to individual plaintiffs and organizations like the Second Amendment Foundation, Firearms Policy Coalition, and National Rifle Association.
There's certainly no shortage of potential targets for additional litigation. States like New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and California continue to impose onerous restrictions on lawful gun owners, and local officials in some jurisdictions have demonstrated an amazing, if nefarious, talent for turning the supposedly straightforward process of obtaining a carry permit into an expensive, time-consuming ordeal.
The Second Amendment Section could spend years pursuing those cases, assuming it has the personnel, resources, and support from DOJ leadership to do so.
It's entirely possible that Attorney General Blanche and President Trump will select someone who's just as committed to defending the Second Amendment as Dhillon has been. It's also possible that the section will remain intact but become far less aggressive about initiating new litigation.
Dhillon deserves a huge amount of credit for making Second Amendment enforcement a genuine priority within the Civil Rights Division. Whether her departure marks the end of that effort or just a change in leadership will depend on what happens next. The creation of the Second Amendment Section was a welcome development, but its lasting significance will be determined by what it's able to accomplish after the person who championed it has left the building.
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