The Justice Department abandoned its appeal of a ruling that struck down the federal ban on handgun sales to adults under 21 after a little-noticed legal memo found the restriction violates the Second Amendment.
On Monday, the Department of Justice told the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit it was voluntarily dismissing its appeal in the case brought by the Firearms Policy Coalition against the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The move leaves in place a district court decision that invalidated the long-standing federal prohibition on licensed dealers selling handguns to 18-, 19-, and 20-year-olds.
The Daily Caller reported that the government filed a motion under Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 42(b)(2) and a brief arguing the dispute is now moot. Plaintiffs consented to the dismissal, with each side to bear its own costs.
The trigger was a Sept. 17, 2026, opinion from the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel. Responding to a question from the attorney general, OLC determined that Sections 922(b)(1) and (c)(1) of federal law, along with their implementing regulations, are inconsistent with the Second Amendment in light of the Supreme Court’s decisions in Bruen and Wolford.
Those statutes had made it a federal felony for a licensed dealer to sell a handgun to an adult under 21. OLC concluded the challenged restrictions “may not be enforced to impose criminal penalties on dealers who sell handguns” to persons between the ages of 18 and 21.
In its brief to the Fifth Circuit, the department stated the consequences plainly.
"On September 17, 2026, in response to a question from the Attorney General, the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel (OLC) determined that Sections 922(b)(1) and (c)(1), along with their implementing regulations, are inconsistent with the Second Amendment."
The brief continued that the dispute is moot because the department will not enforce the challenged provisions against anyone, anywhere. That non-enforcement decision, DOJ argued, ends any live controversy and means the court need not address the scope of relief plaintiffs had sought.
"The Department of Justice’s determination that it will not enforce the challenged provisions against anyone, anywhere, demonstrates that there is no longer a live controversy."
Even if the court found the case was not moot, the department said the OLC opinion left no basis for expanding the existing permanent injunction.
The OLC memo itself highlighted the contradiction at the heart of the old rule. It noted that American law already treats 18-year-olds as adults for the most serious civic burdens.
"Our laws deem an eighteen-year-old ‘mature enough to be drafted, vote, serve as a juror, and be sentenced to death.’ One such eighteen-year-old represented the United States at the Tokyo Olympics in 2020, shooting skeet."
The memo then drove the point home with a concrete example. That same Olympic skeet shooter, the opinion observed, would have committed a federal felony if a licensed dealer sold her a handgun while she studied at the University of Texas at Arlington, before she left for Tokyo or after she returned.
"Yet, due to statutes predicated on concerns over an eighteen-year-old’s ability to handle a pistol as a responsible adult, it would have been a federal felony if a licensed dealer had sold her such a firearm before she left or after she returned to her studies at the University of Texas at Arlington."
In other words, the government could draft her, put her on a jury, send her to war, or sentence her to death. It just would not let a licensed dealer sell her a handgun.
The lawsuit began in November 2020 as Reese v. ATF and later proceeded as FPC v. ATF. The Fifth Circuit earlier reversed a district court decision that had granted the Biden administration summary judgment. In January, following that appellate ruling, the district court sided with the plaintiffs and issued a permanent injunction against the ban.
Rather than keep fighting to restore the age restriction, the Justice Department chose to walk away after its own lawyers concluded the statute could not stand under current Second Amendment doctrine. The government motion was straightforward.
"Pursuant to Federal Rule of Appellate Procedure 42(b)(2), the government respectfully moves to voluntarily dismiss its appeal in this case, with each party to bear its own costs."
Plaintiffs’ counsel authorized DOJ to represent that they consented. The Firearms Policy Coalition noted the filings on X, pointing to both the motion to dismiss the appeal and the response brief arguing mootness because the federal government “will not enforce the challenged provisions against anyone, anywhere.”
The practical result is clear from the papers: licensed dealers face no federal criminal penalty under those provisions for selling handguns to adults 18 to 20. The department has told the appeals court the controversy is over.
Adults old enough to fight for the country just gained the ability to buy a handgun from a licensed dealer without the federal government treating the sale as a felony, a basic constitutional baseline the bureaucracy finally stopped defending.
