The Gun Case Quietly Moving Through Court That Could Change Everything

The full Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals has agreed to reconsider a question that goes to the foundation of federal gun law: did Congress have the constitutional power to make it a federal crime for a felon to simply possess a gun at home? The case is United States v. Squire, and on July 20, 2026, the court vacated a three-judge panel's June 2 ruling and ordered the case reheard by the full court. The Fifth Circuit, not the Supreme Court, is where the next step happens, and no argument date had been set in the sources we reviewed.

Here is what the ruling could change, and what it could not. It would not wipe out the felon-in-possession law nationwide. An en banc decision binds courts inside the Fifth Circuit. But if the court accepts Squire's argument that Congress cannot reach purely local possession under its Commerce Clause power, Judge Stephen Higginson's dissent warns the logic would not stop at one defendant. Higginson, dissenting from the rehearing order, wrote that the case "hazards untold consequences for federal law."

What is happening

Curtis Squire has a prior heroin distribution conviction. Fox News reported that he was found with a handgun in his New Orleans home. Reason's Jacob Sullum reported that Squire was initially charged locally with attempted second-degree murder after a February 2024 street fight, that those charges were dropped after ballistic testing showed the Glock found in his home did not match the gun fired in the fight, and that he was then charged federally under 18 U.S.C. 922(g)(1). Reason reported that he pleaded guilty while preserving his right to appeal, and Hoodline reported a 52-month sentence.

The panel rejected his Second Amendment challenge. Senior Judge Edith Brown Clement wrote that "our historical tradition supports disarming drug traffickers based on their dangerousness," according to the Independent Institute. Squire's rehearing petition then shifted ground to the Commerce Clause, Reason reported, arguing the law covers "purely intrastate, noncommercial conduct."

That shift followed a June 18 Supreme Court decision, United States v. Hemani, which held that prosecuting a marijuana user under a different part of the same statute violated the Second Amendment, according to the Virginia Lawyers Weekly. The justices did not decide the felon provision. But Justice Clarence Thomas, in a concurring opinion, wrote that the Commerce Clause does not let Congress "regulate or ban possession of any item" that has ever been offered for sale or crossed state lines.

What is getting less attention

A second Fifth Circuit case is moving alongside it. On September 14 the court granted en banc rehearing in United States v. Cordova, Stephen Halbrook wrote in the Volokh Conspiracy. Cordova pleaded guilty to felon-in-possession after prior convictions for drug possession and evading arrest with a vehicle. A panel affirmed on May 20. Judge James Ho, concurring in the judgment, wrote that the statute "imposes a lifetime ban on the possession of a firearm" even for someone never sentenced to prison. Judge Andrew Oldham, also concurring, called the circuit's precedent "historically bankrupt," per Halbrook's account.

Meanwhile, the Supreme Court has stayed away from the felon ban. It declined in March to hear Melynda Vincent's challenge, with the Trump administration urging rejection and noting the Attorney General's authority to restore gun rights to eligible nonviolent felons, Minnesota Lawyer reported. Duke's firearms law center said on July 27 that the justices planned to discuss 30 firearms cases at their September 28 conference, 24 of them challenging the federal felon-in-possession ban or a state equivalent. We could not confirm what the Court did with them.

The other side

Higginson's dissent is the strongest counterargument in the record. He asked whether the federal government could no longer criminalize possession of child pornography or explosives. He also wrote that all other circuits have upheld the statute since the Supreme Court's Lopez decision. The government's own answer to critics of the ban, as it told the Supreme Court in the Vincent case, is that the Attorney General can already restore gun rights to eligible nonviolent felons.

Squire's side answers that the Constitution limits Congress. The Firearms Policy Coalition, a gun-rights group, argues that Congress lacks the constitutional authority to ban a felon's simple possession of a firearm, as Reason reported.

Our Take

This section is opinion.

Does this change everything? No. The stakes are real, but the outcome is not certain. A Fifth Circuit ruling is one court's ruling. We found no report that the Supreme Court has agreed to take up the question.

Even so, it matters. The Constitution gave Congress listed powers and left the general police power to the states. Thomas's warning, in our view, is the heart of it: if a gun's long-ago trip across a state line is enough, then almost any object in your home is a federal matter. A government that can reach everything is the kind we are skeptical of.

Higginson's questions deserve real answers, and we do not dismiss them. But the answer to "what about dangerous people?" is not that Washington's power has no edge. States remain free to write and enforce their own laws. Even readers who disagree with us should watch the Fifth Circuit's calendar. Its published schedule lists an en banc session in New Orleans on January 20 to 22, 2027, though we could not confirm Squire is on it.