Last Friday President Trump issued an extraordinary Executive Order “Protecting Second Amendment Rights.” While the EO is focused on firearms, as we often have to remind folks, the Second Amendment doesn't say "firearms," it simply says "arms," and that includes knives. The EO's Plan of Action encompasses efforts that may be directly applicable to Knife Rights’ specific interests:

Sec. 2. Plan of Action. (a) Within 30 days of the date of this order, the Attorney General shall examine all orders, regulations, guidance, plans, international agreements, and other actions of executive departments and agencies (agencies) to assess any ongoing infringements of the Second Amendment rights of our citizens, and present a proposed plan of action to the President, through the Domestic Policy Advisor, to protect the Second Amendment rights of all Americans. (emphasis added)

CLICK HERE to read the complete Executive Order.

Knife Rights Chairman Doug Ritter said, "we are excited and thankful that President Trump has seen fit to make 'Protecting Second Amendment Rights' a key element of his administration. Ultimately, we look for this to be a significant step in the right direction for knife owners."

Knife Rights is currently seeking to have declared unconstitutional under the Second Amendmen... ban on interstate commerce and possession on U.S. lands and Native American lands of switchblade knives (including gravity knives and butterfly knives). The lawsuit does not challenge the FSA’s regulations banning imports.

The Attorney General, an office now held by Trump’s appointee Pam Bondi, is the Defendant in this case. This executive order comes just days after attorneys for the Department of Justice requested additional time to file their reply to Knife Rights’ motion to seemingly confer with the “new administration.”

We are hopeful that this is an instance where Attorney General Bondi will reconsider the DOJ’s defense of the Federal Switchblade Act that is clearly unconstitutional under the U.S. Supreme Court’s Heller and Bruen decisions. Automatically Opening Knives (switchblades) are clearly “arms” covered by the plain text of the Second Amendment and are also not both “dangerous and unusual” and cannot be banned.

They are obviously not as dangerous as a handgun that can be used at a distance. They are also “commonly used for lawful purposes.” This common use test can be proved by the total number in common use, numbering in the hundreds of thousands to millions, categorically, as another form of common folding knives that number in the tens of millions, and jurisdictionally, in that possession is legal in 45 states.

Knife Rights is America’s grassroots knife owners’ organization; Rewriting Knife Law in America™ and forging a Sharper Future for all Americans™. Knife Rights efforts have resulted in 50 bills enacted repealing knife bans in 31 states and over 200 cities and towns since 2010, as well as numerous litigation victories.