A summer day in front of the US Supreme Court Building in Washington, DC.
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The Supreme Court has ruled that the government can’t automatically take away someone’s right to own a gun just because they use cannabis, with advocates for cannabis reform calling this a big win.
On Thursday, the justices unanimously ruled in United States v. Hemani that federal prosecutors crossed the line when they went after Ali Danial Hemani, a U.S.-Pakistan dual citizen from Dallas area, simply for having a gun while being a regular cannabis user.
This decision puts real limits on a federal law that blocks illegal drug users from having guns. And with cannabis use on the rise, this ruling could matter for millions across the country.
At the center of the case was the question of whether the federal government could determine that any cannabis user is automatically too risky to own a firearm.
The Supreme Court said no. Unless the government can point to stronger evidence from history or the Constitution, it can’t make that claim.
Back in 2022, federal agents searched Hemani’s parents’ house in Texas. They found a gun, some cannabis, and cocaine. Hemani admitted he uses cannabis every other day. Prosecutors didn’t call him an addict or say he was high or dangerous when handling guns. They just charged him because he used cannabis and owned a gun.
Justice Neil Gorsuch, writing for the court, said the government didn’t meet the test laid out in the 2022 New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen decision, which demands that any new gun rules match up with what’s been common in U.S. history.
The Justice Department tried to argue that banning guns from cannabis users was just like old laws that kept guns away from “habitual drunkards.” But Gorsuch said those laws were about people whose drinking made them truly unable to manage their lives.
“Given all this, it seems the government’s historical laws targeted habitual drunkards not merely because they regularly used intoxicants, or even sometimes used them to excess,” Gorsuch wrote. “Instead, those laws focused on habitual drunkards because their drinking rendered them practically incapacitated and incapable of managing their affairs. And that hardly compares to whom §922(g)(3)’s unlawful user provision targets on the government’s account.”
That’s different from the blanket ban on cannabis users.
The court also noted that historical laws typically targeted individuals whose substance use had reached a level where they were unable to care for themselves or posed a genuine threat to others. But the federal law today goes way further, as it takes away the rights of anyone who just uses a controlled substance regularly, even if that person isn’t actually a threat to anyone.
Today, over 40 states have legalized cannabis, either for medical or recreational reasons, or both. Gorsuch said these changes make it pretty hard for the government to argue that everyone who uses cannabis regularly is automatically dangerous.
“Whatever one thinks of these developments, the federal government has not just tolerated them; it helped fuel them. All of which leaves it awkwardly positioned to suggest that the millions of Americans who now regularly use marijuana are categorically and unusually dangerous,” he said.
Justice Clarence Thomas took it a step further. He questioned whether the federal law itself goes beyond what Congress is allowed to do under the Commerce Clause, since it makes it a crime to have a gun just because it once crossed state lines, even if the person and the gun never leave their hometown.
Joseph A. Bondy, NORML board chair and co-counsel of record for the group’s amicus filing in the case, called the decision an important affirmation of constitutional protections, saying in a statement that the Court recognized that “responsible adults do not forfeit their Second Amendment rights merely because they consume cannabis, absent any individualized showing of dangerousness,” and adding that the ruling rejects the idea that cannabis use alone can serve as a blanket basis for denying firearm ownership.
The ruling aligns with the Supreme Court’s broader shift toward a stricter review of gun restrictions that lack clear historical precedent. In its wake, lower courts have struck down or narrowed a growing number of firearm laws on similar grounds.
In 2023, the 5th Circuit, in the United States v. Daniels, questioned the federal gun ban's constitutionality for cannabis users, and its August 2024 United States v. Connelly decision stated Second Amendment rights cannot be infringed solely based on prior cannabis use. The 8th Circuit's July 2025 United States v. Cordova Perez ruling vacated a daily cannabis user's firearm conviction, declaring drug use doesn't automatically extinguish Second Amendment rights.
Hemani’s case landed at a time when state cannabis laws and federal gun rules are bumping heads more than ever.
Cannabis remains a controlled substance under federal law, even though the Trump administration has started the process of rescheduling state-licensed medical cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule III, a less restrictive category under the Controlled Substances Act, in April 2026. However, recreational cannabis remains under Schedule I. The Justice Department will begin expedited hearings on June 29 to consider broader rescheduling beyond medical applications.
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