DOJ Puts Virgin Islands Assault Weapons Ban in the Crosshairs

The US Virgin Islands (USVI) is not a gun-friendly territory, to say the least. Open carry is prohibited for civilians, permits are required to own firearms, which must be registered, and unless you hold a Virgin Islands Firearms License (for which residency is required), you cannot carry or possess a firearm in the territory – so there is no reciprocity with any US state. In June of this year, USVI banned modern sporting rifles, the ones anti-gunners call assault weapons, and magazines that hold more than 15 rounds of ammunition.

The Civil Rights Division of the US Department of Justice has now asked a federal judge to block enforcement of the new law. In the wake of the Third Circuit Court of Appeals striking down New Jersey’s decades-old assault weapons ban, an injunction would seem to be a no-brainer – especially because the Virgin Islands are within the Third Circuit’s jurisdiction.

Assault Weapons and Magazines Ban in Jeopardy

The USVi ban on assault weapons and standard-capacity magazines (20 or 30 rounds is standard capacity for just about all modern sporting rifles, as the DOJ points out) was particularly egregious. Although rifles owned prior to the ban’s implementation were grandfathered in, magazines were not. That means the owners of those magazines became law-breakers unless they disposed of them.

The Third Circuit Court also nixed a similar New Jersey ban on magazines with a capacity of more than 10 rounds, asserting that "nothing in the text of the Second Amendment suggests that the capacity of a magazine bears on whether it receives constitutional protection."

The DOJ under President Donald Trump has already taken issue with the Virgin Islands Police Department (VIPD) for making life as difficult as possible for the territory’s gun owners. In its brief, the Justice Department describes VIPD’s enforcement of the June law as "only the latest chapter in a years-long pattern or practice of law enforcement misconduct in which the VIPD has deprived the people the USVI of their Second Amendment rights."

The Reciprocity Challenge

The Justice Department also points out, “The restriction on the private purchase, sale, or other transfer of constitutionally protected arms is itself unconstitutional.” The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms, it notes, requires the right to obtain those arms.

The Virgin Islands is not alone in now finding itself squarely on the wrong side of the Third Circuit Court’s ruling that prohibiting civilians from owning so-called assault weapons is unconstitutional. Delaware enacted a similar ban in 2022 and is also within the same appeals court’s jurisdiction.

Gun Owners of America and Gun Owners Foundation are also mounting a legal challenge to USVI’s ban on the possession of firearms by non-residents. If that ends up in the Supreme Court – which has already agreed to hear challenges to assault weapons bans in Connecticut and Cook County, Illinois – that could reverberate across America’s patchwork of reciprocity laws. Currently, while 29 US states now allow “constitutional carry,” or permit-less carry, the rest of the states each have different rules governing which non-residents are allowed to carry. Several states, all of them Democrat-run, have few or no reciprocity agreements, meaning most or all law-abiding gun owners visiting or traveling through those states are prohibited from carrying guns.