Judge denies Hunter Biden‘s bid to dismiss gun charges

A federal judge in Delaware denied Hunter Biden’s bid to throw out his felony gun charges on Thursday, rejecting arguments from the president’s son that the federal prohibition on owning guns while using illegal drugs is unconstitutional under the Second Amendment.

Separately, a federal appeals court panel ruled against Biden earlier Thursday in another bid to have the charges against him tossed. The two decisions appear to clear the way for his case to head to trial on June 3, though his defense team can still pursue further appeals.

Last year, Biden was charged with illegally buying a gun while using illegal drugs and with lying on a government form about his drug use when he made the purchase –– two separate criminal charges. Special counsel David Weiss alleges that Biden bought a gun in October 2018, a time when he was frequently using crack cocaine. Biden has spoken publicly about his struggles with drug addiction.

Federal law bars people who use illegal drugs from buying guns. Biden’s team, however, argued in court that this ban violates the Second Amendment. They pointed to a recent Supreme Court decision, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen, which constrained the government’s power to regulate gun ownership.

Judge Maryellen Noreika, however, was unpersuaded. Norieka, who was appointed by then-President Donald Trump, noted that while the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals found the drug-user ban to be unconstitutional in one situation — specifically, as applied to a habitual marijuana user — that court explicitly emphasized that its decision was quite narrow. And she wrote that the “vast majority” of district courts who have reviewed the drug-user ban in the post-Bruen world have upheld it as constitutional.

She added that Biden can still challenge the constitutionality of the statute as it was applied to him once his trial is complete.

In a separate ruling also handed down on Thursday, Noreika ruled against a motion Biden had filed seeking documents the Justice Department possesses involving communications between or among Donald Trump, former Attorney General William Barr, and other Trump-era senior department officials regarding the Biden case.

Earlier Thursday, a three-judge panel on the Third Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the president’s son on a separate group of motions. Biden had sought to have the charges against him dismissed for several other reasons, arguing he was the victim of selective and vindictive prosecution and that a pretrial diversion agreement he and prosecutors both signed last summer bars the government from charging him.

The federal judges ruled that Biden cannot make those arguments until after his trial is completed. Abbe Lowell, his lead defense lawyer, said in a statement that the team will appeal the panel’s decision.