DOJ Sues Colorado Over 15-Round Magazine Ban — Uses the State's Own Court Stipulations Against It

The complaint in Case No. 1:26-cv-01950 refuses Colorado's "large capacity" framing. It argues magazines over 15 rounds are standard-capacity for America's most popular rifles and pistols, including the AR-15 platform and full-size 9mm handguns like the Glock 17.

Legally, DOJ builds on Heller and Bruen: magazines are arms, semiautomatic firearms cannot function as designed without them, and arms in common use for lawful purposes cannot be banned without a historical analogue from the founding era.

The tactical centerpiece is Colorado's own stipulations from Colorado Outfitters Association v. Hickenlooper and Rocky Mountain Gun Owners v. Hickenlooper (2013). When defending the ban, the state admitted under oath that tens of millions of Americans lawfully own semiautomatic firearms using these magazines, that millions of such magazines exist in Colorado alone, and that AR-15 rifles are typically sold with 20- or 30-round magazines in unrestricted states.

DOJ also cites NSSF data estimating at least 448 million magazines exceeding 15-round capacity nationwide — roughly two for every adult American. Under Bruen, that common-use record is fatal to capacity bans lacking historical tradition.

As with the Denver case, DOJ invokes 34 U.S.C. § 12601 — the federal pattern-or-practice statute — arguing Colorado State Patrol and CBI enforcement of the magazine ban deprives residents of constitutional rights. Relief sought includes declaratory judgment and a permanent injunction halting enforcement.

Dhillon has publicly framed this as the first time DOJ is on citizens' side in Second Amendment enforcement. Two Colorado suits in two days signal a sustained campaign, not a one-off filing. Twelve states plus D.C. currently restrict magazine capacity; a Colorado win creates a federal template to challenge them.

Colorado will bear the Bruen burden to find a founding-era analogue for criminalizing magazines owned by millions of law-abiding Americans. Given the state's own prior stipulations, that burden got harder the moment the complaint quoted them back.