Dangerousness, Not Location: § 922(g)(1) May Disarm Drug Traffickers Even Inside the Home

1. Introduction

United States v. Squire addresses a “novel question” in the Fifth Circuit’s post-New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen landscape: whether the Second Amendment permits Congress to disarm a convicted drug trafficker under 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(1) when the firearm is possessed inside the home.

The parties were the United States (appellee) and Curtis Squire (appellant), who was federally indicted for felon-in-possession after police executing a search warrant found a handgun in his home. Although the gun was not tied to the earlier shooting that prompted the search, Squire’s indictment rested on multiple prior felony convictions, including several heroin-related trafficking offenses (and related firearm/drug and obstruction counts), as well as burglary-related convictions.

The key issue was not whether the home is central to Second Amendment self-defense—District of Columbia v. Heller already makes that point—but whether the Fifth Circuit’s history-and-tradition framework (as refined through its own § 922(g)(1) jurisprudence) recognizes a home-based carveout for a class of offenders deemed historically disarmable due to dangerousness.

2. Summary of the Opinion

The Fifth Circuit (Judge Clement, joined by Judges Southwick and Engelhardt) affirmed Squire’s conviction and sentence. Applying the two-step methodology associated with Bruen and United States v. Rahimi, the court held:

• Step One: The Second Amendment’s plain text covers the conduct prohibited by § 922(g)(1), so Squire’s possession is presumptively protected.
• Step Two: The Government carried its burden by showing a historical tradition of disarming classes of persons perceived as dangerous, which the court deemed “relevantly similar” to disarming convicted drug traffickers.
• Home distinction rejected: The court concluded that the relevant constitutional axis is dangerousness (as defined by the predicate offense class), not the location of possession; the tradition supports disarmament “including inside their homes.”

The holding was expressly narrow: it decides only that § 922(g)(1) is constitutional as applied to a convicted drug trafficker possessing a firearm in his home, and it does not resolve whether other non-dangerous, non-violent predicates could support home disarmament.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited (and Their Role)

A. Supreme Court Second Amendment Framework

• New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022): Supplies the governing “text, history, and tradition” approach and the “relevantly similar” analogue inquiry, organized around the “why” and “how” metrics. Squire uses Bruen to structure the analysis and to emphasize that analogues need not be “historical twins.”
• United States v. Rahimi, 602 U.S. 680 (2024): Reinforces the historical-tradition test and provides the formulation that similar modern restrictions are permissible when they address similar problems for similar reasons. The panel also quotes Rahimi to confirm the Second Amendment’s place in “ordered liberty” (via McDonald v. City of Chicago).
• District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008): Used in two ways: (1) to acknowledge the home as the “core” of Second Amendment self-defense, and (2) to stress the right is “not unlimited,” including the dictum that prohibitions on felon possession are “presumptively lawful.” The panel is careful to treat Heller as a “helpful clue” rather than a substitute for the required historical inquiry.
• McDonald v. City of Chicago, 561 U.S. 742 (2010): Cited through Rahimi to emphasize the Second Amendment’s fundamental status.

B. Fifth Circuit’s Post-Bruen § 922(g)(1) Line

• United States v. Diaz, 116 F.4th 458 (5th Cir. 2024), cert. denied, 145 S. Ct. 2822 (2025): Central to the Fifth Circuit’s approach. Diaz (i) confirms Step One coverage, (ii) rejects treating “felony” as a historically sufficient category by itself, and (iii) adopts a felony-by-felony posture that can allow as-applied invalidation for some felons. Squire leans on Diaz to reject “blanket deference” to Congress’s labels while still allowing categorical judgments when historically justified.
• United States v. Mitchell, 160 F.4th 169 (5th Cir. 2025): Provides the doctrinal articulation of the two-step test and the Government’s “heavy burden,” and highlights the “entrenched circuit split.” Squire uses Mitchell to frame analogical reasoning and to caution that Rahimi did not make “dangerousness” a free-floating universal standard.
• United States v. Connelly, 117 F.4th 269 (5th Cir. 2024): A key historical-analogue discussion. Connelly held that certain “political dissident” and “religious minority” disarmament precedents did not match the “why” for § 922(g)(3) as applied to a non-violent marijuana user, while acknowledging the “throughline” that Founding-era governments disarmed those perceived as dangerous. Squire uses Connelly to validate the “dangerous class” tradition and to explain why the same analogues fit drug traffickers better than casual users.
• United States v. Kimble, 142 F.4th 308 (5th Cir. 2025), cert. denied, 2026 WL 135675 (U.S. Jan. 20, 2026): The most directly relevant comparator. Kimble upheld § 922(g)(1) as applied to drug traffickers, reasoning that trafficking is tied to “intrinsic violence of the drug trade” and fits the dangerous-class tradition. Squire treats Kimble as highly persuasive but addresses the new “inside the home” theory that was not presented there, ultimately extending the logic to home possession.
• United States v. Hembree, 165 F.4th 909 (5th Cir. 2026): Cited to underscore Diaz as the post-Bruen catalyst.
• United States v. Hernandez, 159 F.4th 425 (5th Cir. 2025) (per curiam) and United States v. Schnur, 132 F.4th 863 (5th Cir. 2025): Illustrate the Fifth Circuit’s distinction between predicate offenses involving violent/dangerous conduct (supporting disarmament) versus some non-violent felonies (potentially not). Schnur is also referenced in the Government’s argument as foreclosing aspects of Squire’s predicate-related attacks.
• United States v. Cockerham, 162 F.4th 500 (5th Cir. 2025): An example where a non-violent felony (failure to pay child support) can render § 922(g)(1) unconstitutional as applied, reinforcing that the Fifth Circuit is not applying a blanket felon ban.
• United States v. Bullock, 123 F.4th 183 (5th Cir. 2024) (per curiam): Procedural authority allowing the Government to supplement authority on appeal in the Second Amendment context.
• United States v. Morgan, 147 F.4th 522 (5th Cir. 2025): Confirms de novo review for preserved constitutional challenges.
• United States v. Clark, 582 F.3d 607 (5th Cir. 2009) and United States v. Branson, 139 F.4th 475 (5th Cir. 2025): Used to dispose of Squire’s vagueness challenge (a defendant must show vagueness as applied to his own conduct).

C. Other Federal Authorities and Cross-Circuit Citations

• United States v. Williams, 113 F.4th 637 (6th Cir. 2024): Cited for historical examples of disarming groups deemed dangerous and for caution about unconstitutional classifications by race or religion. The opinion also quotes Williams for the warning that deference cannot let Congress “define away a fundamental right.”
• Zherka v. Bondi, 140 F.4th 68 (2d Cir. 2025): Cited for historical examples of race-based prohibitions and the breadth of colonial disarmament laws.
• United States v. Watson, 171 F.4th 1012 (7th Cir. 2026): Cited as support for the proposition that § 922(g)(1) survives as applied to “dangerous felons,” including drug trafficking predicates.
• Kanter v. Barr, 919 F.3d 437 (7th Cir. 2019) (Barrett, J., dissenting): Used as a succinct statement of the historical/common-sense principle that legislatures may prohibit “dangerous people” from possessing guns.

D. Non-Second Amendment Doctrinal Touchpoints

• Williamson v. Lee Optical of Okla., Inc., 348 U.S. 483 (1955): Invoked as the type of rational-basis “rubber-stamp” deference the Second Amendment framework rejects (via Heller and Bruen).
• United States v. Bean, 537 U.S. 71 (2002): Cited to explain the practical suspension of § 925(c) relief when ATF funding was barred, and the modern restart of the process after the Attorney General rescinded delegation to ATF.
• Vidal v. Elster, 602 U.S. 286 (2024) (Barrett, J., concurring in part): Cited for the proposition that Congress may make “categorical judgments,” which the panel uses to frame disarmament of drug traffickers as a permissible category-based decision grounded in historical tradition.
• McIntyre v. Ohio Elections Comm'n, 514 U.S. 334 (1995) (Scalia, J., dissenting): Cited to support consulting post-enactment tradition for “color” regarding constitutional rights.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

A. The Two-Step Bruen/Rahimi Method as Applied

The court applies the now-familiar structure:

• Step One (Text): Relying on United States v. Diaz and United States v. Schnur, the court concludes the Second Amendment’s plain text covers Squire’s possession, and convicted felons remain among “the people.” This is an important procedural pivot: the Government cannot win by claiming felons are categorically outside the Second Amendment’s scope at Step One (at least under this circuit’s approach).
• Step Two (History & Tradition): The burden shifts to the Government to show historical analogues that are “relevantly similar,” evaluated through the “why” (problem addressed) and “how” (burden imposed) metrics. The court repeats that the Government’s burden is “heavy,” but that it need not produce a “dead ringer.”

B. The Core Dispute: A Home-Based Carveout vs. Dangerous-Class Disarmament

Squire’s theory is conceptually simple: because the right of self-defense in the home sits at the “core” of the Second Amendment (a point strongly associated with Heller), history should not permit “permanently disarming a man in his own home—whether he has a prior felony conviction or not.” He supplements this with historical and scholarly discussion of natural law, the “castle doctrine,” and the idea that historical public-carry restrictions were more common than restrictions on keeping arms in the home.

The panel’s response is equally direct: Squire’s account is “incomplete” because the historical record includes disarmament regimes aimed at classes perceived as dangerous, and some of those regimes did not stop at the doorstep. The court emphasizes:

• Dangerousness must be historically grounded, not legislatively declared: The panel cautions against “blanket deference” to Congress’s line-drawing and rejects felony status as an automatic proxy for constitutional disarmament (consistent with Diaz). But it accepts that some categories, when supported by history-and-tradition reasoning, may be disarmed.
• Drug trafficking is treated as inherently dangerous: Echoing United States v. Kimble, the court views drug trafficking as tied to the “intrinsic violence of the drug trade” and thus within the historically disarmable “dangerous class.” Critically, the court frames its conclusion as resting “solely on his drug trafficking offense,” not on an individualized, free-form judicial assessment of Squire’s personal dangerousness.
• Location does not alter the analogue fit: The court acknowledges the home’s special constitutional status but concludes historical disarmament practices were not limited to regulating public carry. It contrasts examples suggesting some home exceptions existed with a Pennsylvania loyalty-oath regime that barred keeping arms in the “house or elsewhere.” From this, the panel draws its key doctrinal move: § 922(g)(1) may constitutionally operate “based on dangerousness, not location.”

C. How the Court Uses Connelly and Kimble Together

A notable feature of the reasoning is how the court aligns two seemingly competing impulses in Fifth Circuit precedent: (1) Connelly rejects certain analogues for non-violent marijuana users under § 922(g)(3); (2) Kimble accepts closely related analogues for drug traffickers under § 922(g)(1).

Squire treats these cases as complementary rather than inconsistent: both recognize the “throughline” of disarming perceived dangers to public order; they diverge only on whether the challenged modern regulation targets a comparable kind of danger. The “inside the home” theory is then addressed by insisting that at least some historical disarmament laws were categorical and not spatially limited, thus preserving the analogue “how/why” fit even in the home context.

D. The Court’s Limiting Principles

The panel attempts to keep the decision bounded:

• It calls the holding “narrow” and declines to decide whether the Second Amendment allows home disarmament for convictions lacking a “relevantly similar historical analogue to dangerousness, violence, or threats to public order.”
• It distinguishes its reasoning from “interest balancing,” expressly prohibited by Bruen.
• It notes (without making it dispositive) that federal law includes a relief mechanism in 18 U.S.C. § 925(c), and describes the modern administrative change restarting that process, while acknowledging Squire did not pursue it.

3.3 Impact

Within the Fifth Circuit, United States v. Squire adds an important clarifying rule to the circuit’s felony-by-felony, as-applied § 922(g)(1) doctrine: where the predicate is drug trafficking, the constitutionality of disarmament does not depend on whether the firearm is possessed in public or inside the home. This narrows a potential defense strategy that would attempt to constitutionalize a location-based exception rooted in Heller’s “hearth and home” rhetoric.

For future § 922(g)(1) litigation, the decision:

• Reinforces Kimble’s classification of drug trafficking as “inherently dangerous” for historical-analogue purposes, treating it as a paradigmatic “dangerous class” predicate.
• Signals that “home possession” is not a universal trump card at Step Two; rather, home status is one feature in the analogue analysis and can be outweighed when historical disarmament practices were categorical.
• Leaves open the continued viability of as-applied challenges for some non-violent felonies (consistent with Mitchell and United States v. Cockerham), especially where the Government cannot show a comparable “why” tied to danger or threats to public order.

Beyond the Fifth Circuit, Squire contributes to the ongoing national disagreement the panel itself notes—how to reconcile § 922(g)(1) with the post-Bruen framework—by expressly rejecting a home-based limitation for a dangerous-felon subset. That framing may sharpen the doctrinal questions for further appellate or Supreme Court review: whether, and how, “home-core” reasoning should constrain categorical disarmament traditions.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

• Facial vs. as-applied challenge: A facial challenge argues the statute is unconstitutional in all its applications; an as-applied challenge argues it is unconstitutional as applied to a particular person or set of facts. Squire’s main argument was as-applied to him.
• The Bruen test (two steps): Step One asks if the Second Amendment’s text covers the conduct; Step Two asks whether the regulation fits America’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. If Step Two is satisfied, the conduct can fall outside the Amendment’s “unqualified command.”
• “Why” and “how” metrics: “Why” asks what problem the historical law addressed (e.g., public danger, threats to order). “How” asks how severely and in what way it burdened the right (e.g., confiscation, categorical bans, location limits).
• Historical analogue (not a “historical twin”): The Government does not need to find an identical Founding-era statute; it must show a representative, well-established analogue that is “relevantly similar.”
• “Dangerousness” as used here: The court does not treat “dangerousness” as a case-by-case judicial gut-check; instead, it ties dangerousness to the nature of the predicate class—here, drug trafficking as “inherently dangerous” under circuit precedent.
• Castle doctrine / “home is special” idea: This is the historically rooted notion that the home holds elevated status for self-defense. The panel accepts the home’s importance but holds that historically grounded categorical disarmament can still reach into the home for certain dangerous classes.

5. Conclusion

United States v. Squire establishes a focused but significant Fifth Circuit rule: § 922(g)(1) may constitutionally disarm convicted drug traffickers even when the firearm is possessed in the home, because the relevant historical tradition supports disarming dangerous classes and was not strictly confined to regulating public carry.

The decision is also a methodological reaffirmation of the Fifth Circuit’s post-Bruen approach: felony status alone is not enough; the Government must still justify disarmament through historical analogues. But where the predicate offense places the defendant in a historically comparable “dangerous” category—here, drug trafficking—the court will treat location (including the home) as insufficient to defeat the analogue fit.