Fellow Advocate,

I’m coming to you with some good news: Today, the U.S. Supreme Court decided in U.S. v. Rahimi to uphold decades of established law, keeping guns out of the hands of individuals with civil domestic violence restraining orders. 

But there’s even better news. This ruling affirms the constitutionality of one of our legislative priorities, long halted by PA Senate Leadership.

The 8-1 opinion, written by conservative Chief Justice John Roberts states, “when an individual has been found by a court to pose a credible threat to the physical safety of another, that individual may be temporarily disarmed consistent with the Second Amendment”.¹ That’s a perfect articulation of exactly what an Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) does. Effectively, SCOTUS agrees with the majority of Pennsylvanians² that ERPOs are constitutional. 

This might come as a shock to the Pennsylvania Senate Leadership, who have been stalling bipartisan, House-passed legislation to create ERPOs, questioning their constitutionality³ for over a year. Will you help us spread the good news to Senators Baker, Pittman, and Ward by sending them a quick message demanding they move House Bill 1018⁴ (ERPO Bill) to a hearing in the PA Senate?

In contrast to last week’s disastrous decision overturning the federal bump stock ban, today, SCOTUS sided with the majority of Americans who believe our government plays a vital role in protecting the most vulnerable among us. This decision reaffirmed Pennsylvania’s Act 79 of 2018,⁵ a bipartisan, life-saving law which disarms domestic abusers, and it just invalidated the argument against ERPOs. 

SCOTUS got it right this time, upholding decades of laws keeping firearms away from domestic abusers. Now, we have an opportunity to build on this victory and demand a (now very clearly) constitutional ERPO law in Pennsylvania. Will you send a prewritten, but editable, message to PA Senate leaders Lisa Baker, Joe Pittman, and Kim Ward imploring them to advance House Bill 1018 in the Senate?

Thank you for taking action,
Adam Garber
Executive Director
CeaseFirePA Action