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Page Number: 23

Cite as:  602 U. S. ____ (2024) 

1 

SOTOMAYOR, J., concurring 

SUPREME COURT OF THE UNITED STATES 

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No. 22–915 
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UNITED STATES, PETITIONER v. ZACKEY RAHIMI 

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF 
APPEALS FOR THE FIFTH CIRCUIT 

[June 21, 2024] 

JUSTICE SOTOMAYOR, with  whom  JUSTICE KAGAN  joins,

concurring. 

Today, the Court applies its decision in New York State 
Rifle  &  Pistol  Assn.,  Inc.  v.  Bruen,  597  U. S.  1  (2022),  for 
the  first  time.    Although  I  continue  to  believe  that  Bruen 
was wrongly decided, see id., at 83–133 (Breyer, J., joined 
by  SOTOMAYOR  and  KAGAN,  JJ.,  dissenting),  I  join  the 
Court’s  opinion  applying  that  precedent  to  uphold  18
U. S. C. §922(g)(8).

The Court today emphasizes that a challenged regulation 
“must  comport  with  the  principles  underlying  the  Second 
Amendment,” but need not have a precise historical match. 
Ante, at 7–8.  I agree.  I write separately to highlight why 
the Court’s interpretation of Bruen, and not the dissent’s, is 
the right one.  In short, the Court’s interpretation permits 
a  historical  inquiry  calibrated  to  reveal  something  useful 
and transferable to the present day, while the dissent would 
make the historical inquiry so exacting as to be useless, a 
too-sensitive alarm that sounds whenever a regulation did 
not exist in an essentially identical form at the founding. 

I 
  Even under Bruen, this is an easy case.  Section 922(g)(8)
prohibits  an  individual  subject  to  a  domestic  violence  re-
straining order from possessing a firearm, so long as certain 
criteria  are  met.  See  ante,  at  3–4.    Section  922(g)(8)  is