Published on August 21, 2025 at 9:30 am
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Siding with medical marijuana patients in a Florida case, an appeals court on Wednesday found that federal restrictions barring pot patients from buying and using guns appears to run afoul of the Second Amendment.
The federal government “failed to meet its burden … to establish that disarming medical marijuana users is consistent with this nation’s history and tradition of firearm regulation,” the decision by a three-judge panel of the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals’ panel said.
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Then-Florida Agriculture Commissioner Nikki Fried and medical marijuana patients filed the lawsuit in 2022 challenging the prohibitions. While marijuana is illegal under federal law, Florida voters in 2016 passed a constitutional amendment to allow patients to use marijuana for medical conditions.
The lawsuit said the federal prohibitions “forbid Floridians from possessing or purchasing a firearm on the sole basis that they are state-law-abiding medical marijuana patients.”
ALSO READ: Fried files appeal after federal judge rejects medical marijuana users possessing guns
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But U.S. District Judge Allen Winsor dismissed the case in November 2022, spurring the plaintiffs to go to the Atlanta-based appeals court. Agriculture Commissioner Wilton Simpson, who was elected in 2022 to succeed Fried, dropped out of the case, but it has continued with the patients as plaintiffs.
In citing, the “nation’s history and tradition of firearm regulation,” the panel used a standard that courts focus on when determining whether gun restrictions can withstand constitutional scrutiny. The analysis has evolved following a series of seminal U.S. Supreme Court decisions about gun regulations, including a 2024 ruling in a case known as United States v. Rahimi.
The panel heard arguments in the pot patients’ case in October 2023 but put it on hold pending the outcome of the Rahimi case.
Lawyers for then-President Joe Biden’s administration argued that the gun restrictions are warranted because they apply to people who “would endanger themselves or others” because of their drug use.
“Rahimi itself recognized that ‘(s)ince the founding, our nation’s firearm laws have included provisions preventing individuals who threaten physical harm to others from misusing firearms,'” a Justice Department brief said. “The limited restriction at issue here, which applies only to individuals engaged in the regular and ongoing use of illegal drugs, ‘fits comfortably’ within that tradition and the principles underpinning it.”
But Wednesday’s 26-page decision, authored by Judge Elizabeth Branch, said the allegations must be construed “in the light most favorable” to the plaintiffs and “do not lead to an inference that they, because they are medical marijuana users, can fairly be labeled as dangerous” and thus are “disarmed wrongly.”
The ruling, joined by Judges Gerald Tjoflat and Robert Luck, reversed Winsor’s dismissal of the case and sent it back to the judge for further consideration.
Fried, who is chairwoman of the Florida Democratic Party, lauded the appeals-court decision.
“This is a huge win for freedom. No medical cannabis patient should have to choose between their rights to their medicine or their right to bear arms,” Fried said in a text message.
In court documents, lawyers for the plaintiffs argued that there was no historical tradition of disarming people “who have not committed serious or violent crimes and who have not shown themselves to be a threat to the safety of others.”
The panel appeared to agree.
Branch wrote that plaintiffs Vera Cooper and Nicole Hansell “cannot fairly be labeled as dangerous people solely due to their medicinal marijuana use.”
Cooper and Hansell disclosed they were medical-marijuana users when filling out a federal form that requires people seeking to purchase guns to identify if they are an “unlawful user of or addicted to marijuana … or any other controlled substance.” Gun stores refused to sell them firearms after they answered “yes,” according to court documents.
ALSO READ: Ruling is eyed in a guns and medical marijuana case in Florida
Another plaintiff, Neill Franklin, is a retired law-enforcement officer who owns a gun and wants to become a medical-marijuana patient.
The panel rejected the federal government’s argument that the restrictions are in keeping with the nation’s history of disarming people deemed dangerous, such as people who are mentally ill or drug addicts.
“Viewing these allegations in the light most favorable to Cooper and Hansell, it appears they use rational thought in making their decision to use marijuana and would stop their marijuana use if they were placed at risk of criminal prosecution. Accordingly, Cooper’s and Hansell’s mental state is a far cry from that of addicts and alcoholics whose actions are controlled by their need to use alcohol or drugs,” Wednesday’s ruling said.
Daniel Russell, an attorney with the Jones Walker firm who represents the plaintiffs, called the decision “an enormous step in the right direction toward normalization of Florida’s medical marijuana program.”
“Purchasing doctor-recommended medical marijuana, through Florida’s constitutionally implemented system, should not deprive anyone of their Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms,” Russell said in a text message.
