According to U.S. Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dhillon, the right to keep and bear arms like the quintessentially American AR-15 will soon be backed by the Supreme Court. 

Dhillon’s Department of Justice filed suit against the State of Colorado this week over its ban of standard-capacity AR-style rifles, which are among the most common and popular modern sporting rifles in the nation. If the Supreme Court supports the DOJ’s position, it could spell the end of numerous similar bans across the country.

On May 6, the Justice Department filed its suit against the state of Colorado, alleging that the state was unconstitutionally banning the ownership of firearms protected under the U.S. Constitution.

“Colorado’s ban on certain magazines is political virtue signaling at the expense of Americans’ constitutional right to keep and bear arms,” said Dhillon in a release from the DOJ’s website. “Under my direction, the Division’s Second Amendment Section will continue to defend law-abiding Americans’ rights against unconstitutional restrictions on their right to possess arms, which are owned by tens of millions of their fellow citizens.”

Colorado’s statutes currently make it a crime to possess so-called “large-capacity” magazines, which is a de facto ban on many of the most common firearm designs. Furthermore, the state has confessed that its ban on these items includes the specific targeting of standard magazines for such firearms.

Yet, the Supreme Court’s landmark decision in the District of Columbia v. Heller case held that the Second Amendment protects the right of law-abiding citizens to possess firearms that are in common use for lawful purposes. Thus, the DOJ argues, Colorado and many other states are well past the foul line of the law with their gun bans for firearms like the common AR-15.

A decision in this case could have massive implications for gun rights across the country.