{"id":424,"date":"2026-06-19T16:57:02","date_gmt":"2026-06-19T20:57:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/?p=424"},"modified":"2026-06-19T16:57:02","modified_gmt":"2026-06-19T20:57:02","slug":"can-marijuana-users-own-guns-north-carolina","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/can-marijuana-users-own-guns-north-carolina\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Marijuana Users Own Guns in North Carolina?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Can marijuana users own guns in North Carolina after <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/United-States-v.-Hemani.pdf\">United States v. Hemani<\/a><\/em>? The Supreme Court decided the gun-rights vs. marijuana case on June 18, 2026, and the answer is somewhat narrower than several headlines suggest. The Court did not legalize marijuana under federal law or announce a constitutional right for every marijuana user to possess a firearm. It also did not strike down the applicable federal statute in full. Instead, the Court held that the government could not prosecute\u00a0 18 U.S.C. \u00a7 922(g)(3) based on marijuana use alone.<\/p>\n<p>That distinction controls almost everything that follows. News coverage has already produced headlines suggesting the Court erased the federal ban on gun ownership by marijuana users. That is not what happened. The Court rejected the government&#8217;s effort to apply a particularly broad reading of \u00a7 922(g)(3), the federal law that prohibits firearm possession by an unlawful user of a controlled substance, to a defendant whose only proven conduct was regular marijuana use at home.<\/p>\n<p>For gun owners in North Carolina, the ruling opens new constitutional arguments while leaving substantial federal exposure in place.<\/p>\n<div class=\"read_more_link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/can-marijuana-users-own-guns-north-carolina\/\"  title=\"Continue Reading Can Marijuana Users Own Guns in North Carolina?\" class=\"more-link\">Continue reading<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Can marijuana users own guns in North Carolina after United States v. Hemani? The Supreme Court decided the gun-rights vs. marijuana case on June 18, 2026, and the answer is somewhat narrower than several headlines suggest. The Court did not legalize marijuana under federal law or announce a constitutional right for every marijuana user to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":431,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[245,259,250,252,168,248,258,88,256,246,242,247,244,257,239,254,255,240,251,149,241,243,249,238,253],"class_list":["post-424","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-criminal-defense","tag-18-usc-922-g-3","tag-as-applied-second-amendment-challenge","tag-atf-form-4473","tag-bruen-decision","tag-cole-williams-law","tag-constitutional-law","tag-controlled-substances-and-firearms","tag-durham-criminal-defense-lawyer","tag-federal-criminal-defense","tag-federal-firearms-law","tag-federal-gun-charges","tag-firearm-possession-charges","tag-gun-ownership-and-marijuana","tag-gun-rights-litigation","tag-hemani-decision","tag-justice-gorsuch","tag-justice-thomas-concurrence","tag-marijuana-and-gun-rights","tag-marijuana-users-and-guns","tag-north-carolina-criminal-defense","tag-north-carolina-gun-laws","tag-second-amendment","tag-supreme-court-gun-cases","tag-united-states-v-hemani","tag-united-states-v-rahimi"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.4 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>Can Marijuana Users Own Guns in NC After Hemani?<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Gun ownership, marijuana use, federal prosecutions, and ATF regulations collide. Learn what the law says and where the uncertainty remains.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/can-marijuana-users-own-guns-north-carolina\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Can Marijuana Users Own Guns in NC After Hemani?\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Gun ownership, marijuana use, federal prosecutions, and ATF regulations collide. Learn what the law says and where the uncertainty remains.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.colewilliamslaw.com\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/06\/Can-Marijuana-Users-Own-Guns-in-North-Carolina.webp\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Cole Williams Law\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"12 minutes\" \/>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"Can Marijuana Users Own Guns in NC After Hemani?","description":"Gun ownership, marijuana use, federal prosecutions, and ATF regulations collide. 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