President Biden on Sunday was asked to assess the state of the U.S.-Mexico border after the expiration of pandemic era policy Title 42 last week. 

‘Much better than you all expected,’ Biden said when asked by reporters during a bike ride near his vacation home in Rehoboth, Delaware. 

The president said he had no immediate plans to visit the border for doing so, he argued, would ‘just be disruptive.’ 

Biden’s comments come after U.S. Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas said border patrol agents have seen a 50% drop in the number of migrants crossing the border since Thursday. 

‘The numbers we have experienced in the past two days are markedly down over what they were prior to the end of Title 42,’ Mayorkas said on CNN’s ‘State of the Union’ program. He said there were 6,300 border encounters on Friday and 4,200 on Saturday, but cautioned it was still early in the new regime.

Mayorkas credited the criminal penalties for migrants who illegally enter the country, which resumed under existing law after Title 42’s expiration, for the decrease in crossings. The COVID-era rule adopted under former President Donald Trump allowed officials to expel migrants quickly without an asylum process but did not impose penalties.

Biden told reporters Sunday he hoped border crossing would continue to go down but cautioned more work was needed to be done and help was needed from Congress. 

The Biden administration’s post-Title 42 plan requires migrants to schedule an immigration appointment through an app or seek protection from countries they passed through on their way to the U.S. border. If they do not follow the process and are caught entering the U.S. illegally, they are not allowed to try again, even through legal means, for five years. There are prison terms for other violations.

Officials from communities along the border agreed they had not seen the large numbers of migrants that many had feared would further strain U.S. border facilities and towns. 

‘The amount of migrants we were expecting initially – the big flow – is not here yet,’ Victor Trevino, mayor of Laredo, Texas, told CBS News’ ‘Face the Nation.’ 

Despite the Biden administration’s assurances, multiple communities have been straining their resources to deal with an influx of migrants in recent weeks. 

Last week, outgoing Chicago Mayor Lori Lightfoot issued an emergency declaration in response to illegal migrants being sent to her city by Texas Gov. Greg Abbott. 

An influx of migrants has also sparked chaos in New York City, from where Mayor Eric Adams has fought with upstate counties to send busloads of asylum seekers for temporary housing, sparking contentious legal battles. 

The Texas Department of Public also said Saturday it was temporarily ending its partnership with the Austin Police Department. 

Austin Police Chief Joseph Chacon told FOX 7 Austin that because Texas DPS is being deployed to border cities, their operations would temporarily cease in Austin. Texas DPS has been working with Austin authorities to investigate violent crimes and drug offenses. 

The need for securing the border was also highlighted by San Diego’s confirmation of an Afghani on the terror watch list who was arrested at the U.S.-Mexico border after attempting to cross. 

Fox News’ Andrea Vacchiano and Reuters contributed to this report.

A former aide to Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., is now a senior official within the New York State Communist Party. 

Records, first reported on by The New York Post, show 33-year-old Justine Medina worked for Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign for much of 2020, earning around $35,000. 

After working for the congresswoman, Medina was named ‘Co-chair of the New York Communist League’ by the People’s World, a publication of the Communist Party. 

The publication now lists Medina as serving on the Executive Committee of the New York State Communist Party who is also active in the Amazon Labor Union at JFK8. 

As an aide to Ocasio-Cortez, Medina said she was responsible for ‘organizing and writing policy language with Anti-War Veterans & the Peace Movement.’ 

Medina’s years-old tweets highlighted by The Post show her unapologetically proclaiming her alignment with communism. 

‘[W]ell, I *am* a Communist, but work for AOC & helped start Queens DSA’s Electoral WG, so I def see utility in working on the Dem ballot line!’ Medina tweeted in October 2020. 

In another tweet, she described communism as being about ‘equality, democracy, peace, the advancement of workers, the oppressed and humanity in general.’ 

She ominously added that the path to communism will be ‘unkind’ to those who ‘block progress.’ 

‘[B]ut communism is good and shouldn’t scare you,’ she said.

Medina later appeared to capitalize on The Post article. 

‘Friends, I have an announcement to make,’ she quoted in a re-post of The Post. 

In response to a reply questioning whether she adhered to the Maoist or Leninist variety of Communism, Medina said she subscribed to ‘Marxist-Leninist-Robesonist’ thought, a reference to Karl Marx, Vladimir Lenin, and Paul Robeson.

While modern-day adherents of communism have tried to water it down, the ideology has been the driving force behind many political movements throughout the 20th century, killing upwards of 100 million people. The Soviet Union’s communist dictator Joseph Stalin starved millions of Ukrainians in the 1930s. China’s communist dictator Mao Zedong led the Cultural Revolution and Great Leap Forward, the death toll from which is estimated to have been above 40 million. Cambodia’s Khmer Rouge communist leader, Pol Pot, imposed brutal programs during his brief rule in the 1970s that are estimated to have killed about one-fourth of his own country’s population.

Fox News Digital has reached out to Medina and Ocasio-Cortez’s office for additional comment. 

President Joe Biden was awarded an honorary doctorate degree from Howard University on Saturday for his ‘analytical intellect’ and ‘popularity on both sides’ – claims mocked by conservatives on Twitter and contradicted by recent polls.

Dr. Wayne Frederick, the president of Howard University, introduced Biden with high praise at the school’s 155th commencement on Saturday.

‘Admired for your sound analytical intellect and open embrace for all, your popularity on both sides of the aisle of the United States led to your illustrious reputation and outstanding service of 36 years as a Democratic senator from Delaware beginning at a tender age of 29,’ Frederick said of Biden.

Conservatives mocked the description of Biden on Twitter, saying it ‘feels like parody.’

‘Was there any part of Biden’s visit that didn’t sound like trolling?’ Matt Whitlock, a Republican consultant, tweeted. ‘Between the ‘popularity on both sides of the aisle’ and Biden’s phony condemnation of ‘those who seek to divide us’ (while his twitter account accuses R’s of shoving grandma off a cliff) this feels like parody.’

‘There is no way this guy is talking about Joe Biden,’ Nathan Brand, a GOP communications professional, tweeted.

Recent polls contradict the notion that Biden is popular on both sides of the aisle and possesses ‘sound analytical intellect.’ An April poll in Gallup showed Biden’s approval rating at an all-time low of 37%. An ABC News/Washington Post poll released last Sunday found that 63% of American adults do not think Biden, 80, has the ‘mental sharpness’ it takes to serve effectively as president.

Dozens of House Republicans, including Rep. Ronny Jackson, R-Texas, who served as former President Barack Obama’s physician, recently demanded that Biden should take a cognitive test or get out of the 2024 race for president.

Biden, in his address to graduating students at the historical Black college, said White supremacy is the ‘most dangerous terrorist threat to our homeland,’ causing backlash on social media with many critics saying he was trying to divide Americans and stoke racial tensions.

‘The harsh reality of racism has long torn us apart,’ Biden said at the historically Black university in Washington, D.C., on Saturday. ‘It’s a battle. It’s never really over, but on the best days, enough of us have the guts and the hearts to stand up for the best in us, to choose love over hate.

‘Union over disunion. Progress over retreat. To stand up against the poison of White supremacy like I did in my inaugural address to single it out as the most dangerous terrorist threat to our homeland.’

Border Patrol agents arrested an Afghan national on the FBI’s terror watchlist after he crossed into the U.S. illegally Wednesday in California, multiple sources at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) told Fox News.

The Afghan national crossed the border with a group of migrants near Otay Mesa, California, the sources said. Border Patrol agents took the migrants to a processing station, where a fingerprint scan determined the Afghan was a match on the Terrorist Screening Database. The FBI was then notified, confirmed the results, and began an investigation.

The arrested subject crossed the border a day prior to the end of Title 42 — a COVID-19 emergency policy that allowed border agents to turn away migrants. Thousands of migrants have flooded to the border since the policy expired.

Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., who represents the district where the arrest was made, told Fox News the Biden administration’s border policies attract terrorists.

‘Biden’s open borders aren’t just a gateway to five million illegals, record human and child trafficking and the deadliest drug crisis in our history,’ Issa said. ‘Biden’s reckless policy is also an open invitation to even the most wanted terrorists in the world to come to America. They know they’ll never have to leave. The nation knows what’s going on and this president has only begun to be held accountable for what he has done.’

Issa’s office said they confirmed the arrest of the suspected terrorist with their local CBP.

California’s reparations task force is calling for the state legislature to require all cities and counties with allegedly segregated neighborhoods to submit all their real estate ordinances to a state agency for approval based on whether they maintain or lessen ‘residential racial segregation.’

The task force, created by state legislation signed by Gov. Gavin Newsom in 2020, formally approved last weekend its final recommendations to the California Legislature, which will decide whether to enact the measures and send them to the governor’s desk to be signed into law.

The recommendations include several proposals meant to address ‘housing segregation’ and ‘unjust property takings’ that contributed to alleged systemic racist against Black Californians. Among the most controversial of the housing proposals is one that would seemingly hand over control of local land use decisions to a state agency that would approve ordinances based on whether they maintain or decrease segregation. 

‘Residential zoning ordinances have been used for decades in California to prevent African Americans from moving into neighborhoods, thereby maintaining residential segregation,’ the reparations committee writes in the final report outlining its proposals. ‘Various laws were also used to prevent additional housing from being built, effectively shutting out African Americans.’

To address local zoning laws that ‘reinforce and recreate this systemic housing segregation,’ the task force continues, the legislature should identify California cities and counties that have historically redlined neighborhoods – areas flagged as risky investments where residents are therefore denied financial services such as loans or insurance – and whose ‘current levels of residential racial segregation are statistically similar to the degree of segregation in that city or county when it was redlined.’

After these areas are identified, the task force calls on the legislature to ‘require identified cities and counties to submit all residential land use ordinances for review and approval by a state agency, with the agency rejecting (or requiring modification of) the ordinance if the agency finds that the proposed ordinance will maintain or exacerbate levels of residential racial segregation.’

In other words, if a city or county with a neighborhood deemed segregated wanted to implement an official change involving real estate, that change would need to be approved by a state agency based on whether it made the area more racially diverse.

The task force recommends the removal of this process for ‘additional review and approval’ of the flagged cities and counties only if the city or county ‘eliminates a certain degree of housing segregation in its geographic territory.’

However, the reparations committee suggests an alternative option as well for such localities: creating an ‘administrative appeal board to review challenges to developmental permitting decisions or zoning laws’ and basing decisions on whether development permits and zoning requirements are deemed ‘to maintain or reinforce residential racial segregation.’

Beyond an official review process, the task force also proposes increasing home ownership among Black Californians by providing assistance through either direct financial aid or subsidized down payments, below-market-rate mortgages, and homeowner’s insurance. 

Another recommendation is to provide a so-called ‘right to return’ for Black residents ‘displaced’ by development projects, ‘racially restrictive covenants,’ ‘state-sanctioned violence,’ and ‘racial terror’ to come back to those areas to live.

‘The task force recommends the legislature enact measures to support a right to return for those displaced by agency action, restrictive covenants, and racial terror that drove African Americans from their homes,’ the committee writes. ‘The right to return should give the victims of these purges and their descendants preference in renting or owning property in the area of redevelopment. The right to return should extend to all agency-assisted housing and business opportunities in the redevelopment project area.’

The task force additionally wants state lawmakers to give ‘preference in rental housing, home ownership, and business opportunities for those who were displaced or excluded from renting or owning property in agency-assisted housing and business opportunities developed in or adjacent to communities formerly covered by restrictive covenants.’ This preference should extend to the families and descendants of those allegedly displaced by ‘agency-assisted development,’ according to the report.

The committee’s final recommendations include a host of other housing-related proposals – such as repealing policies limiting those with criminal records from renting property, funding housing-focused anti-racism education programs, and establishing diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) certification programs for affordable housing contractors, providers, and decision makers.

California is no stranger to controversial housing measures, especially those in which the state seeks to wrest control from local authorities. Indeed, California has imposed quotas on local governments to provide land for housing, particularly for lower-income families, and to streamline permits for these projects. Most of the state’s 482 cities are complying – but not all, particularly in the suburbs.

Many of the communities seeking to thwart the housing mandate are overwhelmingly Democratic areas around San Francisco, but the one catching the most flak from Newsom’s office is the city of Huntington Beach, a Republican area in Orange County that’s openly resisting the quota.

‘The city has a duty to protect the quality and lifestyle of the neighborhoods that current owners have already bought into and for the future sustainability of Huntington Beach,’ City Councilman Pat Burns wrote in a letter to colleagues earlier this year. ‘Radical redevelopment in already-established residential neighborhoods is not only a threat to quality and lifestyle, but to the value of the adjacent and neighboring properties.’

Huntington Beach Mayor Tony Strickland, a Republican, echoed that sentiment at a meeting last month. 

‘People don’t want an urban community here,’ he said. ‘I believe if we just went along, it will have a severe negative impact on our community’s quality of life.’

Days later, Newsom, Attorney General Rob Bonta, and the Department of Housing and Community Development jointly announced a motion amending a lawsuit from March with the goal of holding Huntington Beach accountable for violating the state Housing Element Law. The law requires local governments to adopt housing plans that include sufficient opportunities for development.

California is seeking penalties and injunctive relief, as well as suspension of the city’s authority to issue building permits and a court order mandating the approval of certain residential projects until the city comes into compliance with the law.

‘Huntington Beach continues to fail its residents,’ Newsom, a Democrat, said in a statement at the time. ‘Every city and county needs to do their part to bring down the high housing and rent costs that are impacting families across this state. California will continue taking every step necessary to ensure everyone is building their fair share of housing and not flouting state housing laws at the expense of the community.’

‘California is in the midst of a housing crisis, and time and time again, Huntington Beach has demonstrated they are part of the problem by defiantly refusing every opportunity to provide essential housing for its own residents,’ added Bonta. ‘The city’s refusal last week to adopt a housing element in accordance with state law is just the latest in a string of willfully illegal actions by the city – decisions that worsen our housing crisis and harm taxpayers and Huntington Beach residents… We’ll use every legal tool available to hold the city accountable and enforce state housing laws.’

However, several cities across California don’t have certified, compliant housing elements, according to the state’s housing tracker, leading Strickland to accuse the Newsom administration of singling out his city.

‘The fact that the attorney general is singling out Huntington Beach only strengthens the city’s arguments in court that the state is not following the law with these housing mandates,’ the mayor said in a statement last month. ‘These regular state press releases announcing legal actions against Huntington Beach may grab headlines, but they do not intimidate or deter the city, and they have no effect in the court of law, where these conflicts of law will ultimately be decided.’

Earlier this month, Newsom sued the city of Elk Grove for not approving housing projects for the homeless.

A busload of migrants from Texas was unloaded at the Naval Observatory in Washington, D.C. on Sunday, where Vice President Kamala Harris’s home is located at Number One Observatory Circle, according to reports.

An ABC local news station in Washington, D.C. tweeted videos of migrants getting off the bus and grabbing their belongings from the storage area underneath.

This is not the first time Texas Governor Greg Abbott has sent a bus full of immigrants from the U.S.-Mexico border to the vice president’s home.

A bus of migrants was dropped off outside of Harris’s home on Christmas in 2022. Migrants were also bused to the Naval Observatory in September and October. 

The governor began sending migrants from border cities to the nation’s capital in April 2022 to pressure the Biden administration to act on immigration enforcement and border security.

Abbott said in a letter to President Biden at the time that his policies ‘leave many people in the bitter, dangerous cold as a polar vortex moves into Texas.’

‘Texas has borne a lopsided burden caused by your open border policies,’ Abbott added.

As Title 42 was getting ready to expire last Thursday, Abbott spoke with Fox News’s Jesse Waters, pledging to continue sending buses full of migrants to liberal northern municipalities, including New York and Chicago.

‘There will be more coming,’ Abbott said of the buses his state particularly dispatches. ‘There will be more going to New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, and other places across the country.’

The governor also provided the latest stats from Operation Lone Star, saying Texas was doing what no other state has done before to protect communities as the president ends Title 42.

Those stats suggest there were 373,000 apprehensions, 28,000 criminal arrests, 402 million lethal fentanyl doses seized and over 17,600 migrants bused to sanctuary cities.

AI experts and tech-inclined political scientists are sounding the alarm on the unregulated use of AI tools going into an election season.  

Generative AI can not only rapidly produce targeted campaign emails, texts or videos, it also could be used to mislead voters, impersonate candidates and undermine elections on a scale and at a speed not yet seen.

‘We’re not prepared for this,’ warned A.J. Nash, vice president of intelligence at the cybersecurity firm ZeroFox. ‘To me, the big leap forward is the audio and video capabilities that have emerged. When you can do that on a large scale, and distribute it on social platforms, well, it’s going to have a major impact.’

Among the many capabilities of AI, here are a few that will have significance ramifications with elections and voting: automated robocall messages, in a candidate’s voice, instructing voters to cast ballots on the wrong date; audio recordings of a candidate supposedly confessing to a crime or expressing racist views; video footage showing someone giving a speech or interview they never gave. 

Fake images designed to look like local news reports, falsely claiming a candidate dropped out of the race.

‘What if Elon Musk personally calls you and tells you to vote for a certain candidate?’ said Oren Etzioni, the founding CEO of the Allen Institute for AI, who stepped down last year to start the nonprofit AI2. ‘A lot of people would listen. But it’s not him.’

Petko Stoyanov, global chief technology officer at Forcepoint, a cybersecurity company based in Austin, Texas, has predicted that groups looking to meddle with U.S. democracy will employ AI and synthetic media to erode trust.

‘What happens if an international entity — a cybercriminal or a nation state — impersonates someone? What is the impact? Do we have any recourse?’ Stoyanov said. ‘We’re going to see a lot more misinformation from international sources.’

AI-generated political disinformation already has gone viral online ahead of the 2024 election, from a doctored video of Biden appearing to give a speech attacking transgender people to AI-generated images of children supposedly learning satanism in libraries.

AI images appearing to show Trump’s mug shot also fooled some social media users even though the former president didn’t take one when he was booked and arraigned in a Manhattan criminal court for falsifying business records. Other AI-generated images showed Trump resisting arrest, though their creator was quick to acknowledge their origin.

Rep. Yvette Clarke, D-N.Y., has introduced legislation that would require candidates to label campaign advertisements created with AI. Clark has also sponsored legislation that would require anyone creating synthetic images to add a watermark indicating the fact.

Some states have offered their own proposals for addressing concerns about deepfakes.

Clarke said her greatest fear is that generative AI could be used before the 2024 election to create a video or audio that incites violence and turns Americans against each other.

‘It’s important that we keep up with the technology,’ Clarke told The Associated Press. ‘We’ve got to set up some guardrails. People can be deceived, and it only takes a split second. People are busy with their lives and they don’t have the time to check every piece of information. AI being weaponized, in a political season, it could be extremely disruptive.’

The Associated Press contributed to this report. 

EXCLUSIVE: China’s expansive artificial intelligence (AI) operations could play a concerning role in the 2024 election cycle, Sen. Pete Ricketts warned on Thursday.

‘There’s absolutely a possibility that they could do that for the 2024 election, and that’s what we have to be on guard [for],’ Ricketts told Fox News Digital in an interview in his Senate office.

During a Senate Foreign Relations subcommittee hearing earlier this month, Ricketts referenced China and its use of AI technology to create ‘deepfakes,’ which are fabricated videos and images that can look and sound like real people and events. A report released earlier this year by a U.S.-based research firm claimed a ‘pro-Chinese spam operation’ was using AI deepfakes technology to create videos of fake news anchors reciting Beijing’s propaganda. Those videos were disseminated across social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter and YouTube, the report said. Meanwhile, China has its own regulations limiting the reach of deepfakes within its borders.

Ricketts compared the effort to the Soviet Union’s vast propaganda network in the latter half of the 20th century. 

‘I think there’s a big parallel here between what the Soviet Union did back during the Cold War, where they outspent us like ten-to-one on this sort of propaganda, and what the CCP is doing right now where they’re spent outspending us ten-to-one, and now they’re trying to leverage that dollar advantage with the technology advantage of using AI,’ he said.

Ricketts revealed that he himself had been in contact with AI experts at the University of Nebraska at Omaha and other places ‘to come up with some strategies [on] what we can do.’

‘One of the key things that we have to do, really, is education for our own people about how they have to look at media now and think critically about it,’ the senator said. ‘Because there could be a good chance it’s completely made up, it’s completely false. Even if you see somebody, an image of somebody you think you know, it could be created through a computer program.’

He suggested that the U.S. government could work with colleges and universities researching AI technology on a ‘template’ for teaching people to be aware of deepfakes.

‘One of the things that we can do, as the federal government, is think about, well, what are the things we want to do when we’re saying, ‘Okay, we need to teach people – think critically,’ can we come up with some ideas on what that means? Maybe create a template or something that we can share with universities that they can adapt,’ Ricketts said.

He was wary of the suggestion that the federal government could create its own AI office to educate people, citing a bloated bureaucracy, but called on his colleagues to stay ‘on topic’ and learn as much as they can about the rapidly developing technology.

‘I’m always very careful about creating more government bureaucracy, so I’m not sure we want to run and do that. There are probably places that we can already address this,’ Ricketts said. ‘But I think part of it is just for my colleagues and for me to get educated on this, and what the capabilities are. And like I said, it’s moving very quickly, so we’ve got to stay on topic.’

Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, shared a pair of videos to Twitter late Thursday evening showing what he found during a visit near the Rio Grande along the United States-Mexico border in Brownsville, Texas.

In the first video, Cruz is standing next to a barbed wire barrier that runs along the border when he points toward Mexico, noting there are ‘over 22,000 illegal immigrants right across the river.’

‘Joe Biden, this is your fault,’ Cruz said in the video, scolding the president.

‘The people who are killed crossing illegally, that is your fault,’ he continued. ‘The women who are sexually abused crossing illegally, that is your fault. The children who are brutalized crossing illegally, that is your fault. The people who are dying of drug overdoses — over 100,000 last year — that is your fault.’

Cruz urged the president to take responsibility for the current border crisis, demanding that he visit the border so he can see the madness first-hand.

‘Come down here President Biden. Stop hiding in the basement, stop pretending this misery is not your fault, stop it. This is not humane, this is not compassionate. This is cruel,’ Cruz said.

‘You can see the lights, you can see a fire,’ Cruz explained. ‘If you look, they are waiting for Title 42 to expire, and then the invasion we are going to see is going to be massive.’

He continued: ‘We already have the worst illegal immigration in the history of our country and in just a few hours it’s getting worse.’

In a second video, Cruz walked along a road near the Rio Grande and said he found a sandal belonging to girl who is ‘no more than 5 or 6 years old.’

‘She might even be younger than that,’ he continued, describing the current immigration situation as ‘horrific and cruel.’ Cruz also said blame for the border crisis should rest squarely with President Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris and ‘every congressional Democrat.’

The video was shared on Twitter just 30 minutes before the Title 42 public health order is set to expire at 11:59 p.m. on Thursday, May 11.

The Republican added: ‘Biden brought back catch and release, he halted construction of the wall, & he ended the Remain in Mexico policy. Now Biden has let #Title42 expire!’

‘There is a full-blown invasion unfolding, and Texas is paying the price,’ Cruz added in a third tweet late Thursday evening, again blaming President Biden and Department of Homeland Security Sec. Alejandro Mayorkas.

Around the same time of Cruz’s stern rebuke, Sec. Mayorkas released his own statement claiming that the U.S.-Mexico border remains secure and affirmed Border Patrol agents would continue to remove migrants.

‘The border is not open,’ Mayorkas said in a video. ‘Starting tonight, people who arrive at the border without using a lawful pathway will be presumed ineligible for asylum.’

He added: ‘We have 24,000 Border Patrol Agents and Officers at the Southwest Border and have surged thousands of troops and contractors, and over a thousand asylum officers to help enforce our laws. Do not believe the lies of smugglers.’

Immigration officials have warned for weeks that the expiration of Title 42 public health order, a COVID-era rule that authorized border officials to swiftly remove migrants, would prompt a surge of migrants to the border.

Customs and Border Protection agents have encountered more than 10,000 individuals at the border on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday of this week, just before Title 42’s expiration, sources told Fox News.

Each of these is the highest-ever single-day record. Officials have predicted the border could see as many as 14,000 migrants daily after Title 42 expires.

Lawmakers in Congress, both Republicans and Democrats, have criticized President Biden’s handling of border security between the U.S. and Mexico.

A federal judge in Virginia has struck down a law prohibiting licensed federal firearms dealers from selling handguns to 18- to 20-year-olds, finding that it violates their Second Amendment rights and is unconstitutional.

In a 71-page ruling issued Wednesday, U.S. District Court Judge Robert Payne said that since adults under 21 have the right to vote, join the military and serve on a federal jury, there is no reason why federal law should restrict them from buying a firearm.

‘If the Court were to exclude 18-to-20-year-olds from the Second Amendment’s protection, it would impose limitations on the Second Amendment that do not exist with other constitutional guarantees,’ Payne wrote.

‘Because the statutes and regulations in question are not consistent with our Nation’s history and tradition, they, therefore, cannot stand,’ he wrote.

His opinion relied heavily on the Supreme Court’s Bruen decision, which said that courts must review the country’s ‘historical tradition of firearm regulation’ to evaluate the constitutionality of a gun restriction. That landmark ruling has led to several successful challenges to longstanding gun control laws brought by gun owners and Second Amendment groups.

Since the Bruen decision, courts have declared unconstitutional laws including federal measures designed to keep guns out of the hands of domestic abusers and defendants under felony indictment, as well as a ban on possessing guns with the serial number removed. A federal judge recently cited the high court decision in ruling against a Minnesota law prohibiting 18- to 20-year-olds from getting permits to carry handguns in public. A judge struck down a similar law last year on gun restrictions for young adults in Texas.

Payne, who cited the 2022 Supreme Court ruling repeatedly in his ruling, wrote that the government failed to present ‘any evidence of age-based restrictions on the purchase or sale of firearms from the colonial era, Founding or Early Republic.’ The lack of similar regulations from those time periods indicates that the ‘Founders considered age-based regulations on the purchase of firearms to circumscribe the right to keep and bear arms confirmed by the Second Amendment,’ he wrote.

This class action lawsuit was brought by John Corey Fraser, 20, and other plaintiffs who said the Gun Control Act of 1968 and subsequent regulations from the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) were unconstitutional because they excluded all adults under 21 from ‘exercising the right to keep and bear arms.’ Fraser, 20, had attempted to purchase a Glock 19x handgun from a licensed dealer but was turned away, according to the lawsuit. 

Elliott Harding, an attorney representing Fraser, was pleased with Payne’s decision and expressed confidence the ruling will be upheld on appeal. 

‘Even though it ensures that future buyers can now purchase these firearms in the federal system — one that includes background checks and other requirements — we expect the defendants will appeal,’ Harding told the Associated Press.

Harding noted that 18- to 20-year-olds are currently allowed to buy handguns from private sellers, calling it a ‘loophole’ that is ‘completely unregulated.’ 

‘This allows them to go in and buy a registered firearm, direct from a manufacturer, but they’ll also go through background checks,’ he said. ‘They have to go through the traditional steps in purchasing a firearm.’

Everytown Law, a legal group that supports gun control and filed a brief supporting the ban on handgun sales to adults under 21, said the law is constitutional and an essential tool for preventing gun violence. 

‘Not only are guns the leading cause of death for U.S. kids and teens, but research shows us that 18- to 20-year-olds commit gun homicides at triple the rate of adults 21 years and older,’ said Janet Carter, Everytown Law’s senior director of issues and appeals.

‘The Court’s ruling will undoubtedly put lives at risk,’ Carter added, ‘It must be reversed.’

The Justice Department and ATF did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

The Associated Press contributed to this report.