In both the Heller and Bruen decisions, one phrase keeps coming up. That phrase is “in common use.” In other words, how common a gun is has a direct impact on what kind of gun control the courts will find constitutional.

As a result, part of the argument against modern sporting rifles has been that they’re not commonly used.

Yeah, I know, they’re the most popular firearm type in the country, with 24 million of them in the hands of American citizens. However, since they’re not super common in self-defense situations, I suppose they think they’re not being used.

However, it seems one anti-gun lawmaker may have just hosed his entire side of the gun control debate.

Say this for Representative Jerry Nadler (D-NY), he may be an enemy of our rights, but some enemies can actually be extremely helpful for our cause. During a mark-up for HR 1808, the assault weapons ban that passed with the help of two Republicans (five Democrats voted against it), he made remarks that will come back to bite him in court.

“The problem is that they’re in common use.”

With those eight words, any competent attorney could go to the Supreme Court and secure a ruling that should kill semi-auto bans – at least in terms of constitutionality. But Nadler’s damage to anti-Second Amendment extremism has the potential to be so much greater than that.

Michael Kinsey once said a gaffe was when a politician unintentionally told the truth. Well, in this case, that is what Nadler did, and for those understandably unwilling to trust an anti-Second Amendment extremist, just check out the latest estimate from the National Shooting Sports Foundation. If they are willing to defy the Supreme Court – like New York and California are – then they will likely just end up also making Clarence Thomas’s day.

Now, Nadler’s words aren’t the defining authority by any stretch of the imagination. It’s unlikely that, by themselves, the courts will overturn a so-called assault weapon ban.

However, where Nadler’s words screw his side over is that he’s right.

The AR-15 is the most common gun currently being sold. That’s pretty “common use” right there in and of itself. That will play a factor in any legal proceedings.

But where Nadler’s comments hurt gun control, as Ammoland’s Harold Hutchinson notes, is that this is evidence they know it’s in common use and simply don’t care what the courts have to say about it.

In other words, they know it’s going to be found to be unconstitutional. They just want to push it through anyway.

Now, couple this with the discussion of packing the Supreme Court and you can see the game plan. What Democrats want to do is pass laws that are currently unconstitutional, then pack the Court with enough of their pics so that these laws would survive legal challenge.

They’re bound and determined to infringe upon your right to keep and bear arms, and they know they’ll have to fundamentally change how our nation works in order to do it.

Nadler tipped the Democrats’ hand with that one comment.

Remember it going forward.