AR-15s are typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes—including self-defense, which the Supreme Court has called “the core lawful purpose”—and so are protected under the Second Amendment. That provision also guarantees the right to keep and bear certain arms for another key purpose: “the security of a free State.” AR-15s help secure both the individual and the system of constitutional liberty.
Two cases, which the Supreme Court has accepted for review, challenge the bans on AR-15s in Cook County, Illinois, and Connecticut. Americans possess an estimated 20 to 30 million AR-15s, using them for self-defense, sporting, and hunting. AR-15s are “in common use” for lawful purposes and so protected by the Second Amendment.
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Today, the Cato Institute launches Your Verdict Counts, a nonpartisan civic education initiative anchored by an eight-minute short video designed to help Americans better understand their rights and responsibilities when called to serve on a jury.
The campaign focuses on educating prospective jurors about rights they are rarely told about before entering the courtroom. This includes the ability to vote according to their conscience, protections against punishment for a verdict, and the fact that “reasonable doubt” has no fixed legal definition and is left to each juror’s judgment.
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Louisiana is no stranger to violating the constitutional duty to disclose exculpatory evidence to criminal defendants. In fact, half of the Supreme Court’s decisions reversing convictions on this basis come from Louisiana. Juan Matthews’s case is yet another entry in that troubling record and a further example of how Louisiana state courts are failing to uphold the Constitution’s guarantee of a fair trial.
Juan Matthews was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1992 after the state withheld a substantial amount of exculpatory evidence. Over 30 years into his prison sentence, a records request revealed previously undisclosed police files. These files “supplied an eyewitness who described a different man fleeing the scene, showed that the state’s central eyewitness may not have seen the shooting as she claimed, and revealed that a witness who did not have a prior relationship with the victim or his family was shown Matthews’s photograph but did not identify him as the suspected shooter.”
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Recently, I’ve begun to wonder how it is that grand juries—which have recently begun rejecting politically motivated prosecutions—have blessed prosecutions as ridiculous as that of former Olympian David Hearn.
Earlier this summer, a DC-based federal grand jury indicted Hearn on felony charges for allegedly vandalizing the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool. US Attorney Jeanine Pirro was eventually forced to dismiss the indictment against Hearn—and others—because the damage was caused not by Hearn or other vandals but by a Trump-connected contractor’s botched and rushed installation. As the US Attorney’s Office in Washington, DC struggles to secure convictions, the notion that DC grand jurors drawn from that precise community have greenlighted these prosecutions seems far-fetched—unless grand jurors are being lied to, manipulated, or aren’t being presented with the full picture.
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Fox News congressional correspondent Bill Melugin stated on social media last week that “Biden released illegal alien crimes” are happening “all over the country,” but “almost nobody is being released now.” Official data, however, show that Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is releasing 184 immigrants per day, 41 percent of whom have criminal convictions or pending criminal charges.
ICE is actually releasing more immigrants with criminal convictions and pending criminal charges than during President Biden’s term. Since January 2025, ICE has released 25,712 people with criminal convictions or pending criminal charges, and over 2,000 had violent criminal records. The data complicate the narrative that President Biden was less committed to preventing criminal releases than Trump.
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A former aerospace engineer and current homebrewer, Ohioan John Ream wants to distill spirits at home to enjoy with his wife. He would gladly register a still and pay the relevant federal tax, but an 1868 federal law prohibits home distilling. Operating a still in your home—or on a parcel “connected with” it—is a federal felony. Ream sued the government, alleging that this ban violates the Constitution.
The Sixth Circuit upheld the ban as a necessary and proper means of enforcing the federal tax on distilled spirits, thereby breaking with a Fifth Circuit decision issued just 11 days earlier. Cato filed an amicus brief urging the Supreme Court to review Ream’s case and reverse the decision.
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Civil forfeiture laws permit law enforcement to seize property allegedly connected to criminal activity. These laws have been heavily scrutinized. Congress enacted the Civil Asset Forfeiture Reform Act (CAFRA) to curb erroneous forfeitures and make claimants whole “after wrongful government seizures.” Under CAFRA, a property owner may recover reasonable attorneys’ fees and other litigation costs if he or she “substantially prevails.”
Richard Ross is an attorney who holds client funds in a trust account at a bank. On October 6, 2021, a business wired $29.6 million into that account after receiving a fraudulent email instructing it to do so. The business soon discovered the fraudulent nature of the email and reported this to the authorities. Ross, believing the funds came from a client who settled a copyright matter, distributed them as instructed. When the bank flagged the transaction for fraud, Ross directed it to recall all pending transfers. By acting promptly, Ross prevented the fraudster from stealing $1.5 million dollars.
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