WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court heard nearly two hours of argument Tuesday, January 20, 2026, in Wolford v. Lopez, a Second Amendment case that could decide whether states can make “no guns” the default rule for private property that’s open to the public—unless the owner gives express permission.
At the center is a Hawaii law passed after New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen (2022). Hawaii’s rule generally bars licensed concealed carriers from bringing a handgun onto private property open to the public unless the property owner affirmatively says “yes.”
From the questioning, the Court’s conservative majority sounded skeptical of Hawaii’s approach, while several liberal justices pressed a competing frame: this isn’t a “carry” case so much as a property-consent case.
What Hawaii’s Law Does, in Plain English
Hawaii’s statute flips the default most Americans are used to. In many states, if a business is open to the public, licensed carry is generally allowed unless the owner posts a sign or tells you otherwise. Hawaii’s rule goes the other direction: you can’t assume consent—you must have it.
During argument, Hawaii’s lawyer Neal Katyal put it bluntly: “[T]here is no constitutional right to assume that every invitation to enter private property includes an invitation to bring a gun.”
He added the line that kept coming up in coverage: “[A]n invitation to shop is not an invitation to bring your Glock.”
Gun-rights challengers say that the default rule turns carry into a practical “ban” across everyday life—restaurants, stores, and other places people routinely enter.
The challengers’ pitch: this “default ban” clashes with Bruen and national tradition
Arguing for the gun owners, attorney Alan Beck told the Court Hawaii’s rule is effectively a presumptive ban on carry in public-facing private property, and that the burden is on Hawaii—under Bruen—to prove a comparable historical tradition.
One flashpoint was the challengers’ claim that Hawaii’s broader post-Bruen location rules functionally block carry across most of the state. Justice Clarence Thomas pressed Beck about a headline number often cited in the case, and Beck explained they used an outside firm and public records to estimate coverage:
“[T]he overall laws … presumptively bans carry on 96.4%.”
In rebuttal, Beck also argued the “express consent” model didn’t arise naturally, but as a deliberate response to Bruen, pointing to a national trend and political statements around it.
The justices’ biggest divide: Second Amendment case, or property-rights case?
A major theme—especially from Liberal Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson—was that what’s really being regulated here is how consent works on private property, not the right to bear arms.
In that framing, the Second Amendment already yields to an owner’s right to exclude you; the state is simply choosing whether consent is presumed (unless posted otherwise) or must be explicitly granted.
Other justices were plainly worried about what happens if states can re-label a carry restriction as merely “tweaking trespass.” Justice Neil Gorsuch suggested the Court generally doesn’t let governments redefine property rules to dodge constitutional protections, drawing an analogy to other constitutional contexts.
The Chief Justice and Justice Alito pushed the “second-class right” concern more directly. Reporting on the argument captured Roberts’ warning that the Second Amendment has become a “disfavored right,” while Alito accused Hawaii of pushing gun rights into “second-class” status.
The “Black Codes” dispute: can racist-era gun restrictions count as “tradition”?
The historical-analogy fight got especially tense when Hawaii leaned in part on an 1865 Louisiana law associated with post–Civil War Black Codes. Some justices questioned whether laws designed to disarm newly freed Black Americans can legitimately support modern restrictions.
Justice Gorsuch was openly skeptical of using Black Codes as tradition. Hawaii responded that those laws are a shameful part of history, but still part of what courts must evaluate if the test is history-and-tradition.
Justice Jackson raised a different worry: if courts start taking whole chunks of historical regulation “off the table,” that may expose deeper problems with the Bruen methodology itself.
The federal government sides with the challengers, but the Court wasn’t eager to expand the test
The Trump administration backed the gun owners. Principal Deputy Solicitor General Sarah Harris argued that treating this as just a consent/default-rule question could open the door to broader carry restrictions by redefining property concepts.
But several justices seemed uninterested in building a new “pretext” doctrine to decide gun cases—preferring to keep it simple: does the Second Amendment cover the conduct, and is there a sufficiently similar historical tradition or not?
Why this case matters beyond Hawaii
A ruling that blesses Hawaii’s “express consent” default could strengthen similar laws in other states that adopted post-Bruen location and private-property restrictions.
On the other hand, if the Court strikes Hawaii’s law, states may still allow owners to exclude guns—but they may have to do it the “traditional” way: owners post or tell you “no,” rather than making every lawful carrier assume “no” unless told “yes.”
Either way, the Court’s decision will likely clarify how far states can go in turning ordinary, public-facing private spaces into de facto “sensitive places” through default rules that can then ban your constitutional GOD given rights.
SCOTUS Oral Arguments Wolford v. Lopez January 20th, 2026
Wolford v. Lopez: Why the Supreme Court’s Latest 2nd Amendment Case Risks Missing the Real Threat
