Major breaking news out of Maryland: the National Rifle Association, the Firearms Policy Coalition, and the Second Amendment Foundation have jointly filed a federal lawsuit — National Rifle Association v. Moore, in the U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland — challenging a brand-new state ban on Glock and Glock-style pistols. The defendants are Governor Wes Moore, Attorney General Anthony G. Brown, and State Police Secretary Colonel Michael A. Jackson. This is one of the most direct constitutional confrontations with a handgun ban since Heller itself, and the legal case for striking it down is overwhelming.
What Maryland Actually Did
Governor Moore signed Senate Bill 334 / House Bill 577 into law on May 26, 2026 — effective January 1, 2027. The statute bans the manufacture, sale, purchase, and transfer of so-called “machine gun convertible pistols,” defined as semi-automatic pistols with a cruciform trigger bar. That definition, by design, captures nearly every Glock and Glock-style pistol on the market. The legislature’s stated rationale: the cruciform trigger bar geometry makes it easier for bad actors to install an illegal Glock switch — a pistol converter that converts a semi-automatic pistol into a fully automatic machine gun.
Here is the critical fact Maryland cannot run away from: Glock switches are already a felony. Under 18 U.S.C. § 922(o) and the National Firearms Act, possessing an unregistered machine gun conversion device carries up to ten years in federal prison. Maryland Criminal Law § 4-305.1 piles on a parallel state prohibition. These bans are not at issue in this lawsuit. What Maryland did instead is punish the firearm itself — banning a lawful, constitutionally protected arm — rather than the criminal who would misuse it.
The Heller Test Destroys Maryland’s Argument
The plaintiffs’ complaint, filed by attorneys from Cooper & Kirk, puts the constitutional issue cleanly:
“The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution protects law-abiding citizens’ right to possess, and as a necessary incident of that right, to acquire firearms that are in common use for lawful purposes. This includes handguns, which are the quintessential self-defense weapon and the most popular weapon chosen by Americans for self-defense in the home.”
Under District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008), the government bears the burden of proving that a banned arm is both dangerous and unusual. That is a conjunctive test — both elements must be satisfied. Maryland cannot even get out of the starting blocks on “unusual.” The complaint lays out the market data: as of 2020, Glock held nearly 65% of the U.S. handgun market. In 2021 alone, Glock manufactured 581,944 handguns in the United States. ATF data confirms Glock pistols consistently rank among the top-selling firearms in the civilian market. Law enforcement agencies across the country carry them. The Glock is, by any honest measure, the most popular handgun in America.
The complaint frames it plainly:
“Glock and Glock style pistols are not relevantly different from any ordinary semi-automatic handgun. That is true even though they may be illegally modified. What is more, these pistols are in common use. Indeed, they are among the most popular firearms in the country.”
My read of this is that Maryland is running a transparent workaround: they cannot ban all handguns because Heller closed that door in 2008. So instead they are trying to carve out the most popular handgun by exploiting a feature of its internal design. But Heller’s logic does not permit that maneuver. A handgun ban is a handgun ban whether it targets the entire category or only the most popular subcategory.
Constitutional Rights Are Not Defined by Their Potential for Misuse
The deeper principle at stake here extends well beyond Glocks. Maryland’s theory — that a firearm can be banned because a criminal could illegally modify it — would gut every constitutional right if applied consistently. My free speech rights can be used to plan a crime. My Fourth Amendment rights protect criminals from warrantless searches just as much as law-abiding citizens. We do not define the scope of a constitutional right by how a bad actor might abuse it. We define it by its normal, lawful application.
I have been arguing this point for years. The anti-gun movement in America is not actually interested in disarming Glock-switch-wielding gang members. Those people are already committing multiple felonies. What Maryland’s law does in practice is disarm the millions of law-abiding Marylanders who own Glocks for self-defense, home protection, and sport shooting — people who have never committed a crime and never will.
The Road Ahead: The Fourth Circuit Problem
I will be direct about the court system. This case lands in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit if it is appealed, and the Fourth Circuit is one of the worst anti-gun courts in America. Its track record on Second Amendment cases is grim. The trial court level in Maryland is not a guaranteed win either.
But here is where my view turns more optimistic. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022), transformed the constitutional landscape by requiring historical analogues for any arms regulation. Maryland cannot produce a founding-era law banning the most popular handgun in the country because no such tradition exists. The Heller “dangerous and unusual” test is essentially impossible to satisfy when the arm in question commands 65% of the U.S. handgun market. And I think the Supreme Court is ready to enforce its own precedents. There are at least one or two major Second Amendment victories coming out of the current term alone.
Good luck to the NRA, FPC, and SAF. The law is on their side.
This article is based on analysis by Professor Mark W. Smith, constitutional attorney and Host of the Four Boxes Diner 2nd Amendment channel. Watch the original video here. This does not constitute legal advice.