Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/22-915_8o6b.pdf
Page Number: 28.0

6 

UNITED STATES v. RAHIMI 

SOTOMAYOR, J., concurring 

WISQARS  Nat.  Violent  Death  Reporting  System,  Violent 
Deaths  Report  2020,  https://wisqars.cdc.gov/nvdrs  (show-
ing that 863 people were killed with a firearm by a spouse
or other intimate partner in 2020).  Because domestic vio-
lence is rarely confined to the intimate partner that receives 
the  protective  order,  the  Government’s  interest  extends
even further.  In roughly a quarter of cases where an abuser 
killed an intimate partner, the abuser also killed someone 
else, such as a child, family member, or roommate.  See S. 
Smith, K. Fowler, & P. Niolon, Intimate Partner Homicide 
and Corollary Victims in 16 States: National Violent Death 
Reporting System, 2003–2009, 104 Am. J. Pub. Health 461,
463–464 (2014).  Moreover, one study found that domestic
disputes were the most dangerous type of call for respond-
ing officers, causing more officer deaths with a firearm than
any  other  type  of  call.  See  N.  Breul  &  M.  Keith,  Deadly
Calls and Fatal Encounters: Analysis of U. S. Law Enforce-
ment Line of Duty Deaths When Officers Responded to Dis-
patched  Calls  for  Service  and  Conducted  Enforcement, 
2010–2014, p. 15 (2016). 

While  the  Second  Amendment  does  not  yield  automati-
cally to the Government’s compelling interest, §922(g)(8) is
tailored  to  the  vital  objective  of  keeping  guns  out  of  the 
hands of domestic abusers.  See ante, at 3–4, 14.  Section 
922(g)(8)  should  easily  pass  constitutional  muster  under
any level of scrutiny.

Although  I  continue  to  think  that  the  means-end  ap-
proach to Second Amendment analysis is the right one, nei-
ther party asks the Court to reconsider Bruen at this time, 
and that question would of course involve other considera-
tions  than  whether  Bruen  was  rightly  decided.    Whether 
considered  under  Bruen  or  under  means-end  scrutiny, 
§922(g)(8)  clears  the  constitutional  bar.  I  join  in  full  the
Court’s opinion, which offers a more helpful model than the
dissent for lower courts struggling to apply Bruen.