Third Circuit Strikes Down New Jersey Rifle and Magazine Bans

New Jersey just lost its ban on semi-automatic rifles.

On July 17, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit, sitting en banc, held that New Jersey's “assault firearm” ban and its ban on magazines holding more than ten rounds both violate the Second Amendment. The vote was 10 to 5. The opinion of the court came from Judge Arianna Freeman, and the full package of opinions, concurrences, and dissents runs roughly 192 pages.

You heard that right.

This is the first time a federal appeals court sitting en banc has struck down a state ban on semi-automatic rifles and standard capacity magazines. Every other circuit to reach the question has gone the other way, including the Seventh Circuit eight days earlier.

So we now have a real circuit split, and the Supreme Court already has the issue on its docket. Here is what the court actually said, and what it does and does not change.

The Cases and How They Got Here

Two consolidated challenges drove this. Mark Cheeseman, Timothy Connelly, and the Firearms Policy Coalition filed one the day Bruen came down in June 2022. The Association of New Jersey Rifle and Pistol Clubs filed the other a week later with individual members. The district court consolidated them.

In July 2024, U.S. District Judge Peter Sheridan issued a split ruling. He held New Jersey's AR-15 provision unconstitutional, but only as to the Colt AR-15 for self-defense in the home. He upheld the magazine restriction. Nobody walked away happy, and both sides appealed.

U.S. Court of Appeals for the Third Circuit

The Third Circuit took the case en banc rather than leaving it to a three-judge panel. That matters. An en banc ruling binds the entire circuit, which covers New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware.

The case caption has shifted along the way as New Jersey's attorney general changed. You will see it filed as Cheeseman v. Platkin, Cheeseman v. Davenport, and Cheeseman v. Attorney General New Jersey depending on the source. Same case.

What the Court Held

The holding is short enough to state plainly. Applying the Bruen framework, the court agreed with the district court that New Jersey's ban on the Colt AR-15 violates the Second Amendment. Then it went further.

Because the record supported the same result for the entire class, the court modified the lower court's order to declare the assault firearm provisions unconstitutional as to all semi-automatic rifles covered by the law, not just Colt AR-15s. It also reversed the district court on magazines, holding that the restriction on magazines over ten rounds violates the Second Amendment.

Semi-Automatic Rifles Are “Arms”

The majority started with the obvious. A semi-automatic rifle is a firearm, and a firearm is an “Arm” under the Second Amendment. That means the Constitution presumptively protects the right to keep and bear one, and the burden shifts to New Jersey to justify the ban.

The record showed roughly 24 million AR-15s and similar rifles in circulation, owned for self-defense, hunting, target shooting, and pest control.

You Do Not Have to Shoot Someone to Earn Protection

This is the part I want practitioners to understand, because it has been the anti-gun playbook for three years running.

New Jersey argued that semi-automatic rifles are rarely fired in documented defensive gun uses, so they are not really “in common use” for self-defense. The court rejected it. The Second Amendment protects the right to keep arms, which means possess them. A gun owner does not have to fire at an attacker before his choice of defensive firearm gets constitutional coverage.

The court also confirmed that self-defense is not the only lawful purpose that counts. Hunting and other lawful uses qualify too. As the majority put it, the many millions of semi-automatic rifles in circulation for lawful purposes are plainly in common use.

There is a second layer here that legal analysts have been arguing for years. The court placed the common use question at Bruen‘s second step, the historical step, where the burden sits on the government. That is not a technicality. It means the state has to prove your rifle is dangerous and unusual, rather than making you prove your rifle is common.

Ten Rounds Is a Political Number, Not a Constitutional One

New Jersey argued magazines are either unprotected accessories or a separate category of “large capacity” arms. The court rejected both.

Magazines feed ammunition and are required for many modern firearms to function as designed, so they are protected arms. And the label the legislature picked does not control the scope of the Constitution. New Jersey originally capped magazines at 15 rounds, then dropped it to 10 in 2018.

The majority's line on that is worth reading twice: it cannot be that a magazine holding ten rounds is an “Arm” covered by the plain text but a magazine holding eleven rounds is not.

The record included evidence of more than 100 million 30-round AR-15 magazines in circulation. AR-15 pattern rifles commonly ship with 20 or 30 round magazines from the factory. That is standard equipment, not an exotic upgrade.

Worth noting that the number a legislature picks really is arbitrary once you look across the country. Some states cap at 10, some at 15, some at 17, and most have no limit at all. Our state by state magazine capacity guide lays out where each one currently sits, and it is the fastest way to see how little consistency there is behind the label.

New Jersey Could Not Produce a Historical Analogue

Once the court found a de facto ban on a class of commonly possessed arms, the history question got simple. New Jersey offered gunpowder storage laws, trap gun restrictions, Bowie knife laws, and later pistol and club regulations.

None of it worked. Founding era gunpowder laws were fire safety rules about storing large quantities of powder in crowded buildings, not bans on possessing common weapons. Most Bowie knife laws came decades after the Founding and regulated concealed carry rather than possession.

The court also refused to let New Jersey wave the “unprecedented societal concerns” flag as a shortcut around the historical test. Criminals misusing weapons is not a new problem. The Founders answered it with laws aimed at threatening and criminal conduct, not by disarming peaceable citizens by the millions.

The Separate Opinions Are Worth Your Time

Judge Paul Matey, joined by Judge Jennifer Mascott, wrote separately and did not mince words. He called New Jersey's statute blunderbuss legislation and accused the state's lawyers of prioritizing histrionics over history. On the shifting definitions, he noted that sixteen rounds was large yesterday and eleven rounds is large today, with no limiting principle in sight.

Judge Cheryl Ann Krause dissented, complaining that the ruling makes the Third Circuit the only court of appeals in the nation to extend constitutional protection to AR-15s and standard capacity magazines.

She is right about that, and that is exactly why this decision matters nationally.

What the Decision Does Not Do

Read this section before you do anything.

• It does not cover everything New Jersey banned. The court remanded the challenges involving semi-automatic pistols, semi-automatic shotguns, and other weapons in the state's definition, because the record was less developed on those.
• It is not a green light today. The appellate mandate has to issue, the case returns to the district court, and New Jersey can seek a stay. A published opinion is not a permission slip.
• It does not touch other states. The Third Circuit covers New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Delaware. New York's SAFE Act, Illinois' PICA, California's ban, and every other state restriction remain enforceable in their own jurisdictions.
• It is not the last word in New Jersey. Attorney General Jennifer Davenport called the ruling as unfortunate as it is legally incorrect and pointed out that every other circuit has gone the other way.

If you live in New Jersey, the only responsible move right now is to watch the mandate and any stay order. Being right in a published opinion is cold comfort when you are the test case on a felony charge.

The Circuit Split and What Comes Next

Eight days before this ruling, on July 9, 2026, the Seventh Circuit decided Barnett v. Raoul and upheld Illinois' Protect Illinois Communities Act in a 2 to 1 decision. Judge Amy St. Eve wrote the majority, joined by Judge Frank Easterbrook. Chief Judge Michael Brennan dissented, pointing out that the AR-15 is the best selling rifle in America and that the banned magazines are standard capacity.

So within nine days, two federal appeals courts looked at nearly identical questions and reached opposite answers.

The Supreme Court is already there. On June 30, 2026, the justices granted certiorari in Viramontes v. Cook County and Grant v. Higgins and consolidated them. Those cases ask whether the Second and Fourteenth Amendments protect the right to possess AR-15 platform rifles and similar semi-automatic firearms. Argument is expected this fall. We covered that cert grant and what is at stake in our breakdown of the Supreme Court AR-15 ban cases.

The federal government is not sitting this one out either. The Justice Department filed an amicus brief in support of the Second Amendment claimants in this very case ahead of the en banc rehearing, part of a broader posture we covered in our reporting on DOJ stepping into the assault weapon ban fight. When the federal government is arguing against a state ban and the state loses en banc, that is a meaningful signal about where this is heading.

What the Third Circuit just handed the justices is a fully developed roadmap grounded in Heller, Bruen, Rahimi, Hemani, and Wolford, written by a majority of an en banc court. That carries more weight in the briefing than a panel opinion would.

Court decisions shift the ground under your feet faster than most people track. If you carry across state lines, or you own firearms that are legal where you live and felonies two states over, knowing the actual rules is not optional. Our Concealed Carry Law Hub is where we keep the state by state legal information organized in one place, so you are not relying on a headline to tell you what you can own and where.