Post-Rahimi Constitutionality of 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9) and the Irrelevance of “I Thought It Was Legal” Evidence Under Rehaif

Commentary on United States v. Minor, U.S. Court of Appeals for the First Circuit (Jan. 27, 2026)

1. Introduction

Willie Richard Minor appealed his federal conviction for firearm possession after a prior misdemeanor domestic-violence conviction, charged under 18 U.S.C. §§ 922(g)(9) (prohibited possession) and 924(a)(2) (penalty for “knowingly” violating § 922(g)). The predicate offense was a 2010 Maine simple assault conviction involving his then-wife.

The appeal presented two principal issues:

Second Amendment: whether § 922(g)(9) is unconstitutional on its face and as applied under the historical-tradition test announced in New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen and refined in United States v. Rahimi.
Evidentiary/mens rea: whether the district court wrongly excluded evidence that Minor believed he could lawfully possess a firearm—evidence Minor argued went to the “knowledge” element as interpreted by Rehaif v. United States.

The First Circuit (Chief Judge Barron) affirmed the conviction, holding that § 922(g)(9) fits within the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation as understood after Rahimi, and that the excluded “I thought it was legal” evidence was not relevant to the mens rea the statute requires (and risked confusing the jury).

2. Summary of the Opinion

The court made two core holdings:

Second Amendment: Under United States v. Rahimi, disarming individuals who pose a demonstrated threat of physical violence is consistent with historical tradition. Congress may treat a domestic-violence misdemeanor conviction—proved beyond a reasonable doubt and involving force against an intimate partner—as a sufficient indicator of dangerousness and recidivism risk to justify disarmament under § 922(g)(9).
Evidence exclusion: Evidence that Minor believed he was legally allowed to possess firearms was properly excluded because, under the First Circuit’s en banc decision in United States v. Minor (Minor II), the government need not prove Minor knew he was barred from possessing a gun. “Ignorance of the law is no defense,” and the proffered testimony would have misled the jury by inviting an incorrect legal theory.

3. Analysis

3.1 Precedents Cited

The decision is best understood as the intersection of (i) the Supreme Court’s post-Bruen Second Amendment methodology and (ii) the post-Rehaif interpretation of “knowingly” in federal firearm-status offenses.

A. Second Amendment framework: from Bruen to Rahimi

New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass'n v. Bruen: The court applied Bruen’s two-step approach: if conduct is within the Second Amendment’s “plain text,” the government must show the regulation is consistent with the Nation’s historical tradition of firearm regulation. The court assumed (as did the district court and the government on appeal) that Minor’s conduct fell within the Amendment’s plain text, moving directly to historical tradition.
United States v. Rahimi: This was the controlling new authority. Rahimi upheld § 922(g)(8)(C)(i) (firearm ban while under a restraining order with a credible-threat finding), emphasizing that the key inquiry is “why and how” the regulation burdens the right and that modern laws need not be “dead ringers” for historical analogues. Rahimi identified surety and “going armed” laws as evidence of a tradition of disarming those who pose a “clear threat of physical violence to another.”

The First Circuit treated Rahimi as establishing the principle that disarmament aimed at mitigating demonstrated threats of physical violence is historically rooted—even if modern mechanisms differ.

B. Prior First Circuit authority and doctrinal positioning

United States v. Booker: Booker had upheld § 922(g)(9) under a means-ends framework. The court explained Booker was not controlling after Bruen’s explicit abrogation of that approach, citing United States v. Perez for the law-of-the-circuit exception when intervening Supreme Court authority undermines prior circuit precedent.
United States v. Castillo: Cited for de novo review of constitutional challenges.

C. The knowledge element after Rehaif and Minor II

Rehaif v. United States: Rehaif held the government must prove the defendant knew he belonged to the relevant prohibited “category of persons.” Minor attempted to leverage Rehaif to argue his subjective belief about legality was relevant.
United States v. Minor (Minor II): This en banc First Circuit precedent supplied the decisive mens rea rule. Minor II rejected the notion that the government must prove knowledge of the legal classification “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” under federal law. Instead, it is enough that the defendant knew the facts that satisfy the statutory definition (e.g., misdemeanor, force element, and domestic relationship).
United States v. Minor (Minor I): Background for the procedural history and the evolution of instructions and knowledge issues.

D. Supreme Court domestic-violence firearm jurisprudence and congressional purpose

Voisine v. United States, United States v. Castleman, and United States v. Hayes: These cases were used to explain Congress’s purpose in “clos[ing] a dangerous loophole”—namely that many domestic abusers are convicted of misdemeanors, not felonies, yet firearms and domestic violence are “a potentially deadly combination.”
District of Columbia v. Heller: Invoked through Rahimi to reject the claim that firearm bans in the home are categorically forbidden; Heller recognized “presumptively lawful” prohibitions such as those for felons and the mentally ill.

E. “Knowledge of law” vs “knowledge of facts” and evidentiary exclusion

Bryan v. United States: Quoted for the baseline presumption: “knowingly” usually requires knowledge of facts constituting the offense, not knowledge the conduct is illegal—reflecting the “ignorance of the law is no defense” principle.
McFadden v. United States and Staples v. United States: Used by analogy to reinforce the doctrinal move in Minor II: the mens rea can be satisfied by knowledge of characteristics that bring an item/conviction within a statutory definition, even if the defendant does not know the legal label.
Holmes v. South Carolina: Cited to confirm that excluding evidence due to confusion/misleading risk is constitutionally permissible where probative value is outweighed.
Cheek v. United States and the advice-of-counsel line: Minor argued “good faith reliance on counsel,” citing United States v. Scully, United States v. Beech-Nut Nutrition Corp., United States v. Miller, United States v. Painter, and United States v. Ray. The court distinguished these as specific-intent/willfulness cases, unlike the “knowingly” structure here as interpreted in Minor II.

F. Post-Rahimi circuit alignment

The court emphasized that sister circuits had been unanimous post-Rahimi in upholding § 922(g)(9), citing: United States v. Simmons, United States v. Nutter, United States v. Bernard, United States v. Jackson, and United States v. Gailes. This supported the court’s conclusion that Rahimi’s reasoning extends naturally to the domestic-violence misdemeanor ban.

3.2 Legal Reasoning

A. Why and how § 922(g)(9) burdens the right under Rahimi’s “relevantly similar” test

The court treated Rahimi’s historical analogues (surety and going armed laws) as establishing a permissible regulatory principle: the Second Amendment allows firearm restrictions aimed at mitigating demonstrated threats of physical violence.

Applying Rahimi’s “why and how” inquiry:

Why: Congress enacted § 922(g)(9) to prevent gun violence in domestic contexts and close the “dangerous loophole” left by felon-only bans, based on the reality that domestic violence is commonly prosecuted as a misdemeanor and that recidivism/escalation risk is substantial (supported by Castleman’s observation that domestic violence often escalates over time).
How: The statute disarms only after a criminal conviction of an offense that has as an element the use/attempted use of physical force (or threatened deadly-weapon use) against a spouse or other protected domestic relation. The court stressed that this predicate involves proof beyond a reasonable doubt, aligning at least as well as (and in some respects better than) civil restraining-order mechanisms discussed in Rahimi.

B. Rejecting the “no current dangerousness finding” objection

Minor argued Rahimi requires a court finding of a forward-looking “credible threat” before disarmament. The First Circuit rejected that reading, emphasizing Rahimi’s express limitation (“analysis starts and stops” with the specific provision there) and its broader methodological point: constitutional validity turns on being “relevantly similar” to historically permitted regulations, not on matching each procedural predicate used in one modern statute.

The court’s key move was to treat a domestic-violence misdemeanor conviction as a permissible proxy for future danger, given Congress’s judgment (and the Court’s own recognition in Castleman) that domestic violence frequently recurs and escalates. Thus, disarmament based on past domestic abuse can still be framed as preventing a demonstrated threat of violence.

C. Duration and restoration-of-rights as part of the historical fit

The court also relied on the fact that § 922(g)(9) is not necessarily permanent because 18 U.S.C. § 921(a)(33)(B)(ii) permits firearms possession if the conviction is expunged, set aside, pardoned, or civil rights are restored (absent an express firearms bar). While acknowledging the ban may last longer than a restraining-order-based ban, the court held Rahimi’s logic still applies because historical analogues could impose substantial restraints (including imprisonment) and because relief mechanisms exist.

D. Evidentiary rulings: “I thought it was legal” is not the required knowledge

The evidentiary holding follows directly from Minor II’s interpretation of Rehaif for § 922(g)(9): the government must prove knowledge of the facts that make the defendant a domestic-violence misdemeanant (misdemeanor conviction; force element; domestic relationship), not knowledge of the legal consequence (that the conviction triggers a federal firearm bar) and not knowledge of the law’s existence.

The court framed Minor’s proffer as classic “ignorance of the law” evidence: a claim that he did not realize federal law prohibited him from possessing a gun. Under Bryan v. United States and the general rule, that misunderstanding does not negate “knowingly” as used here. Because such testimony invited the jury to acquit on an incorrect legal theory, the district court could exclude it under Rules 401–403, and doing so did not violate the Sixth Amendment right to present a defense (per Holmes v. South Carolina).

E. Advice-of-counsel and prosecutor-assurance evidence

Minor attempted to repackage the excluded evidence as “good faith reliance on counsel.” The court rejected that analogy, noting Minor’s cited cases concerned statutes requiring specific intent or willfulness. Here, once Minor II defined the mens rea as knowledge of status-defining facts (not knowledge of legal disability), advice-of-counsel about legality does not negate the required mental state.

F. Impeachment theory and waiver

Minor also tried on appeal to justify attorney Hess’s excluded testimony as impeachment of prosecutor Worden. Because Minor did not raise that specific impeachment basis below, review was only for plain error; the court deemed the argument waived for failure to develop a plain-error showing.

3.3 Impact

The decision’s practical significance is twofold:

Second Amendment litigation post-Rahimi: The First Circuit squarely joins other circuits in treating § 922(g)(9) as consistent with historical tradition. The opinion signals that “danger-based” disarmament can be justified not only by contemporaneous judicial threat findings (as in Rahimi) but also by past violent domestic conduct proved in a criminal conviction, especially where legislatures rely on recidivism/escalation dynamics.
Trial practice after Rehaif/Minor II: In § 922(g)(9) prosecutions within the First Circuit, defendants generally cannot pivot to a “I believed I was allowed” narrative to negate mens rea when the government’s theory is knowledge of the status-defining facts. Courts may treat such evidence as irrelevant and misleading, substantially narrowing what “mistake” defenses are viable.

4. Complex Concepts Simplified

A. “Plain text” and “historical tradition” (Bruen)

After Bruen, courts do not ask whether a gun law is “reasonable” in a balancing sense. Instead: (1) If the conduct is within the Second Amendment’s text, it is presumptively protected; then (2) the government must show the regulation matches the Nation’s historical tradition—meaning it is meaningfully similar to historically accepted firearm restrictions.

B. “Relevantly similar” and “why and how” (Rahimi)

A modern law does not need an identical 1700s twin. Courts focus on the law’s purpose (“why”) and its mechanism and burden (“how”). Rahimi treats historical surety/going-armed laws as evidence that disarming people who pose a clear threat of violence fits the tradition.

C. Rehaif “knowledge of status” vs “knowledge of illegality”

Rehaif requires knowledge that you are in the barred category (your “status”), not that you knew the statute existed or that your gun possession was illegal. In this case (per Minor II), “status” means knowing the facts that make the prior offense a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” (misdemeanor; force element; domestic relationship).

D. “Ignorance of the law is no defense”

If a defendant’s claim is: “I did the act, and I knew the relevant facts, but I didn’t realize the law prohibited it,” that usually does not defeat a “knowingly” requirement—unless the statute expressly demands knowledge of illegality (e.g., “willfully” in some contexts).

5. Conclusion

United States v. Minor cements two points in First Circuit law. First, after United States v. Rahimi, the domestic-violence misdemeanor firearm ban in 18 U.S.C. § 922(g)(9) fits within the historical tradition of disarming individuals who pose a demonstrated threat of physical violence, even without a separate judicial “credible threat” finding. Second, in light of United States v. Minor (Minor II) and Rehaif v. United States, a defendant’s belief that firearm possession was legally permitted is generally irrelevant to the “knowingly” element for § 922(g)(9) and may be excluded to prevent juror confusion without violating the right to present a defense.