EXCLUSIVE: DOJ’s New Top 2A Enforcer Sits Down For First Interview Since Getting Gig

Department of Justice (DOJ) Second Amendment Section Chief Barry Arrington sat for his first brief interview since being formally appointed to the position with the Daily Caller News Foundation Friday.

Assistant Attorney General for Civil Rights Harmeet Dhillon announced Arrington’s formal title as Chief of the Second Amendment Section in the Civil Rights Division in a Thursday post on X. Arrington, who initially served as the section’s acting chief after over a decade in Second Amendment litigation, briefly spoke with the DCNF hours before the DOJ filed an amicus brief in a major case pending before the Supreme Court and laid out what the section would address.

“I liken the Second Amendment to nouns. It’s about people, places, and things,” Arrington told the DCNF. “It’s about people, in terms of who can bear arms legally. It’s about places, where can they bear them. It’s about things, what can they bear? And our [remit] is to ensure that governments around the country are enforcing constitutional regulations with respect to every single one of those areas of the Second Amendment influence.”

The Civil Rights Division established the Second Amendment Section following President Donald Trump’s February 2025 executive order regarding the right to keep and bear arms. The order directed then-Attorney General Pam Bondi to “assess any ongoing infringements of the Second Amendment rights of our citizens” and develop a plan to address them.

“If there’s a ban on constitutionally protected semi-automatic rifles, such as the one that just [struck down in] New Jersey by the Third Circuit, we’re going to be right there with the citizens bringing similar suits around the country,” Arrington told the DCNF before moving to address concealed carry licensing. “Licensure is certainly constitutional, Bruen held that. You can require citizens to have a license, many states don’t, but some states do. But if you’re going to require citizens to have a license, you’ve got to give it to them promptly, and you can’t put onerous conditions on it.”

Arrington told the DCNF he never expected he would willingly go to Washington, D.C., even though he had been involved in Second Amendment litigation since 2013.

“It took them a few months, but before one year was out, literally ten months after the administration began, they stood up the Second Amendment section,” Arrington told the DCNF. “When I heard about that, I transitioned from chief counsel of the National Association for Gun Rights into the Second Amendment section and soon afterwards took over as acting chief.”

“I was in Texas, and I never thought I would leave Texas, but I jumped in a car and drove up here and said, ‘Hey, I’ll help out on this project,’” Arrington, who described himself as a life-long Dallas Cowboys fan, told the DCNF.

Arrington credited Dhillon, who spoke with the DCNF in June, with creating a new approach in the Civil Rights Division.

“AAG Dhillon has said that one of the things that’s revolutionary about the way she is directing the Civil Rights Division is we’re not ignoring one of the most prominent civil rights right there, the Bill of Rights, which all other civil rights divisions have done forever, right?” Arrington added at another point in the interview. “And so actually caring about all the civil rights and not just a select few is a new thing in the Civil Rights Division.”

When asked about issues the Second Amendment Section would likely address, Arrington discussed the DOJ’s litigation against Montgomery County, Maryland, as one example during his conversation with the DCNF. The county had enacted a law prohibiting the carrying of firearms in several locations deemed “sensitive,” including churches.

“Montgomery County has an ordinance that as a practical matter makes it impossible for ordinary citizens to go about their daily lives in the populated areas of the county doing business,” Arrington said. “They’ve become a criminal as they walk down the street. That’s intolerable under the Second Amendment, as the Supreme Court recently held in the Wolford case out of Hawaii.”

The Supreme Court struck down Hawaii’s law requiring people carrying firearms to have the explicit permission of private property owners on June 25 in Wolford v. Lopez, ruling Hawaii’s “vampire rule” violated the Second and 14th Amendments.

Both Maryland and a group of plaintiffs, including the Firearms Policy Coalition (FPC) and the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), appealed a ruling by the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit that rendered a split verdict on Maryland’s law banning the carrying of firearms in certain locations, although Maryland dropped its appeal in August.

Arrington also updated the DCNF on the Trump administration’s litigation against the Virgin Islands over its gun-control laws, notable for the territory’s attorneys being rebuked multiple times by United States District Judge Evan Rikhye of the District of the Virgin Islands, a Trump appointee, for failing to meet deadlines. The DOJ filed an amended complaint Wednesday.

“We had a few [things] that we knew about when we filed the case in December,” Arrington said, referencing the initial complaint filed by DOJ. “We found out a few more in the March, April time frame. We found out even more all the way up into August. We were finding out areas where they had been just blatantly ignoring the Supreme Court in violating the Second Amendment.”

“And it turns out, this is not a recent thing, it turns out they admit, they admit, that they have been doing it for over 20 years!” Arrington continued. “And so, look at that amended complaint. That’s where we’re focusing.”

When asked about the section’s involvement in a potentially loaded Second Amendment docket, Arrington noted that in any cases the Supreme Court heard on Second Amendment issues, the Second Amendment Section would work with Solicitor General D. John Sauer’s office.

“The way the Department of Justice works is that the Solicitor General’s office is the one that interfaces with the Supreme Court,” Arrington told the DCNF. “And the Solicitor General will seek our input and has sought our input, but that’s the Solicitor General’s lane, interfacing with the Supreme Court.”

Hours after the Friday interview, DOJ filed an amicus, or “friend of the court,” brief with the Supreme Court in the Viramontes case regarding Cook County’s ban on modern semiautomatic firearms like the AR-15 rifle, which the high court accepted in June.

“The theory that AR-15s are not useful for self-defense is facially implausible,” the DOJ brief read. “AR-15s are highly useful for self-defense, both in their capacity for deterrence and in their lethality.”

“One of those prohibited choices is a total ban on arms, such as AR-15 rifles, that are in common use among law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes,” the brief also said.

Arrington and Dhillon were among the DOJ officials listed in the brief, with Sauer named as the counsel of record.