2026-06-18T14:05:06.460Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/18/politics/hemani-drugs-gun-rights-supreme-court
- 最高法院以全票作出裁决，联邦检察官无法在证明大麻使用者构成危险之前就解除其武装。
- 大法官尼尔·戈萨奇写道，政府将所有定期吸食大麻者一概认定为暴力分子的做法过于越界。
- 这份措辞严谨的裁决并未解决检察官是否可以针对吸毒成瘾或明显具有危险性的吸毒者发起追诉的问题。
本文由AI生成摘要，经CNN编辑审核。
最高法院周四限制了联邦政府解除经常吸食大麻者武装的权力，缩小了1960年代颁布的、旨在将武器排除在经常吸毒的美国人之外的法律的适用范围。
在由大法官尼尔·戈萨奇撰写的全票通过的判决意见中，法院裁定政府对一名吸食大麻男子的追诉违反了第二修正案。
法院以极为受限的方式了结了这起案件，并未就联邦检察官是否可以追诉吸毒成瘾者或吸毒行为对自身或他人构成危险的人等 broader 问题作出裁决。尽管第二修正案通常会导致大法官们在意识形态上产生分歧，但九名大法官一致同意这份判决意见，这一点凸显了此次裁决的局限性。
这起案件的核心人物是美国和巴基斯坦双国籍公民阿里·达尼亚尔·赫马尼，他于2023年被起诉一项违反联邦枪支与毒品相关法律的罪名。尽管司法部指控赫马尼多项罪名——贩毒、吸食可卡因以及同情伊朗——但对他的起诉源于联邦调查局搜查其家族住宅时查获一把格洛克9毫米手枪和60克大麻。
“我们并不否认，有时个人非法吸食大麻（或任何其他受管制物质）可能会使其对他人构成危险，”法院写道。“但在此案中，政府再次否认需要证明任何类似的情况。相反，它要求我们认定任何经常吸食大麻的人一概具有暴力和危险性，无需进一步举证。”
戈萨奇表示，这种做法过于牵强。
这起上诉背后牵涉的因素远超赫马尼自身的案情，包括保守派主导的最高法院近年来推动以历史视角审视枪支法律。与此同时，美国社会对大麻使用的看法也在发生广泛转变：目前约有一半的美国州将少量休闲用大麻合法化，更高比例的州允许医用大麻。
“最高法院似乎刻意回避决定更大的问题，例如将吸毒成瘾者、实际处于醉酒状态的个人或其他并非明显具有危险性的被告的持枪行为定罪是否符合宪法，”CNN最高法院分析师、乔治城大学法学院教授史蒂夫·弗拉德克说道。“但这些问题迟早会再次提交最高法院，届时大法官们将更难回避。”
曾明确表示大力支持第二修正案的特朗普政府，在本案中为联邦法律进行了辩护，辩称枪支和毒品是危险的组合。司法部表示，每年约有300人因违反该法律被起诉，定罪可判处15年监禁。
在3月份的口头辩论中，保守派和自由派大法官显然都对追诉范围的广度存在疑虑。特朗普提名的大法官艾米·科尼·巴雷特曾问道，未经处方服用唑吡坦（Ambien）的人是否会受该法律约束——这个假设凸显了该法律适用范围的模糊性。
此案还增添了政治色彩：总统乔·拜登的儿子亨特·拜登于2024年因违反同一项法律被定罪，当时涉及的是他吸食可卡因成瘾的问题，后来拜登总统赦免了他。
这起案件给了最高法院再次审视其2022年具有里程碑意义的纽约州步枪与手枪协会诉布鲁恩案的机会，该案放宽了美国人在公共场所携带手枪的限制，并要求枪支禁令需与美国建国时期的法律存在关联，才能在第二修正案的挑战中成立。随后，最高法院在两年后的一项判决中明确了这一历史测试标准，维持了一项禁止受家庭暴力限制令约束且被认定存在可信安全威胁的人持有枪支的法律。
因此，赫马尼的案件引发了一场关于殖民时期针对公众醉酒者的枪支禁令的模糊争论。特朗普政府称，这些历史上的法律允许政府解除经常醉酒者的武装。但赫马尼的律师以及支持大麻合法使用的团体联盟表示，这些历史法律并不具有可比性，因为它们仅限制处于主动醉酒状态的人的枪支持有权。
1968年《枪支管制法》的部分颁布背景是罗伯特·F·肯尼迪和马丁·路德·金遇刺事件，该法划定了联邦政府可以解除其武装的人群类别，包括重刑犯和被不体面开除军籍的军人。该法律中关于毒品的条款涵盖了吸毒成瘾者和“非法使用者”。
目前至少有43个州制定了类似法律，限制吸毒者获取枪支。但反对者指出，大多数州的此类法律将可被解除武装的人定义为“惯常”使用者，而联邦法律中并未出现“惯常”一词。
得克萨斯州一家联邦地区法院援引2022年布鲁恩案的判决驳回了对赫马尼的指控。保守派的美国第五巡回上诉法院维持了这一判决，在一份简短的判决书中指出，历史记录仅表明法律禁止被捕时处于主动醉酒状态或受毒品影响的美国人持有枪支。特朗普政府去年向最高法院提起上诉。
“最高法院发出了明确信号：政府不能通过对人们是否具有危险作出一概而论且毫无根据的假设，将大量民众的行为定罪，”美国公民自由联盟法律主任塞西莉亚·王说道，该联盟是赫马尼辩护团队的一员。
“近一半的美国人表示曾在人生的某个阶段吸食过大麻，这项裁决保护了数百万人的权利，限制了政府实施武断和歧视性处罚的能力，”她说道。
CNN记者德文·科尔为本报道撰稿。
本文已更新补充更多细节。
Supreme Court limits power of federal government to disarm drug users
2026-06-18T14:05:06.460Z / https://www.cnn.com/2026/06/18/politics/hemani-drugs-gun-rights-supreme-court
- The Supreme Court unanimously ruled that federal prosecutors cannot disarm marijuana users without showing they pose a danger.
- Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote that the government went too far by assuming all regular marijuana users are categorically violent.
- The narrowly crafted decision leaves unresolved whether prosecutors can target drug users who are addicted or demonstrably dangerous.
AI-generated summary was reviewed by a CNN editor.
The Supreme Court Thursday curbed the power of the federal government to disarm a frequent marijuana user, limiting the scope of a law enacted during the 1960s to keep weapons out of the hands of Americans who regularly use drugs.
In an unanimous opinion written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, the court ruled that the government’s prosecution of a man who used pot was inconsistent with the Second Amendment.
The court settled the case in a way that was exceedingly limited, reserving broader questions about whether federal prosecutors could target people who are addicted to drugs or whose use of drugs makes them a danger to themselves or others. The slimness of the decision was underscored by the fact that all nine justices joined an opinion on an issue, the Second Amendment, that has usually divided them along ideological lines.
The case centered on Ali Danial Hemani, a dual citizen of the United States and Pakistan, who was indicted in 2023 on a single count of violating the federal anti-guns-and-drugs law. Though the Justice Department accused Hemani of many things — dealing drugs, using cocaine and sympathizing with Iran — his indictment followed an FBI search of his family’s home that turned up a Glock 9mm pistol and 60 grams of pot.
“We do not question that sometimes an individual’s unlawful use of marijuana (or any other controlled substance) may render him a danger to others,” the court wrote. “But, again, the government disclaims the need to show anything like that in this case. Instead, it asks us to conclude that anyone who regularly uses marijuana is categorically violent and dangerous without any further showing.”
And that, Gorsuch said, was a bridge too far.
The appeal was wrapped up in forces far greater than Hemani’s own circumstances, including the conservative Supreme Court’s push in recent years to weigh gun laws with an eye toward history. And the case reached the high court at a time of broadly shifting views on marijuana use: roughly half of US states have legalized small amounts of marijuana for recreational use and an even higher share of states allow the drug to be used medicinally.
“The court seems to have gone out of its way to avoid deciding any bigger questions about whether it’s constitutional to criminalize gun possession by drug addicts; by individuals who are actually intoxicated; or in other circumstances in which the defendant is not obviously dangerous,” said Steve Vladeck, CNN Supreme Court analyst and professor at Georgetown University Law Center. “But it’s only a matter of time before those questions will come back to the Court, in cases in which it will be harder for the justices to punt.”
The Trump administration, which has professed robust support for the Second Amendment, nevertheless defended the federal law in this case, arguing that guns and drugs are a dangerous combination. The Justice Department said about 300 people have been charged with violating the law annually. A conviction can carry a 15-year prison sentence.
During oral arguments in March, it was clear both conservative and liberal justices had reservations with the breadth of the prosecution. Justice Amy Coney Barrett, a Trump nominee, asked whether a person taking Ambien without a prescription would be covered under the law – a hypothetical that underscored the law’s scope.
Adding to the political sheen was the fact that President Joe Biden’s son, Hunter Biden, was convicted in 2024 of the same law, though that involved his addiction to crack cocaine. He was later pardoned by President Biden.
The case gave the Supreme Court another chance to revisit its landmark 2022 decision, NYSRPA v. Bruen, that made it easier for Americans to carry handguns in public and required gun prohibitions to have some connection to US founding-era laws to sustain a Second Amendment challenge. The court then clarified that historical test in a decision two years later, upholding a law that bars people who are the subject of domestic violence restraining orders from owning guns when they have been found to pose a credible safety threat.
So Hemani’s case raised a hazy debate about colonial-era gun prohibitions that dealt with public drunkenness. The Trump administration said those laws historically permitted governments to disarm people who were frequently inebriated. But lawyers for Hemani, and a coalition of groups supporting access to marijuana, said those historic laws weren’t analogous because they restricted firearms only for people who were actively intoxicated.
The Gun Control Act of 1968, enacted partly in response to the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King, Jr., created classes of people the federal government could disarm, including those convicted of felonies or dishonorably discharged from the military. The text of the drug provision includes both people who are addicted to drugs and those who are an “unlawful user.”
At least 43 states have similar laws restricting access to firearms for drug users. But opponents noted that most of those laws define the people who could be disarmed as “habitual” users – a word that doesn’t appear in the federal statute.
A federal district court in Texas dismissed the charge against Hemani, pointing to the 2022 decision in Bruen. The conservative 5th US Circuit Court of Appeals upheld that decision, holding in a brief decision that the historical record points only to laws that barred guns for Americans who are actively intoxicated or under the influence of drugs at the time of their arrest. The Trump administration appealed to the Supreme Court last year.
“The court has sent a strong message that the government cannot criminalize the conduct of large numbers of people by making categorical and unfounded assumptions about whether they are dangerous,” said Cecillia Wang, legal director at the American Civil Liberties Union, which was part of the team that represented Hemani.
“With nearly half of Americans reporting marijuana use at some point in their lives, this ruling protects the rights of millions and curbs the government’s ability to impose arbitrary and discriminatory penalties,” she said.
CNN’s Devan Cole contributed to this report.
This story has been updated with additional details.