Democrats in the majority in the Virginia General Assembly passed a number of new gun laws during the 2026 session, including a controversial assault weapons ban. Brad Kutner spoke to elected officials involved in the fight to ask a simple question: Is it all worth it?
“The answer is yes," said Virginia’s Democratic Attorney General Jay Jones in Petersburg last week when asked if he thought the legal fight over Virginia’s new assault weapons ban was worth it. we want to keep our communities safe.”
The law was put on hold by several state courts, and the Supreme Court of Virginia denied Jones’ request to consolidate four different legal challenges to the law. Despite the protracted and resource-intensive legal fights, and a U.S. Supreme Court with a history of favoring gun ownership, Jones said he wouldn’t back down.
“Our office is committed to making sure we’re standing by the laws that are on our books, to enforce those, to work with our state and local partners to make sure that happens,” Jones added.
Republican Senator Bill Stanley is representing firearm retailers and owners in one of the assault weapons ban lawsuits. He believes the Commonwealth should stop defending the law until the highest court in the land rules on similar fights in other states.
“And it will be a nationwide implication so it will affect Virginia," Stanley told Radio IQ in a phone call Monday. "Let’s see what happens in the federal courts.”
These fights aren’t happening in vacuum; last year Democrats picked up more than a dozen seats in the House of Delegates, and swept every executive seat, running partly on a message of new limits on firearms.
Democratic Delegate Garrett McGuire was co-sponsor of the assault weapons ban and a Virginia Tech student during the 2007 campus shooting. He said those personally impacted by gun violence in schools represent a new constituency and folks like Stanley may win in court, but not in the hearts and minds of voters.
“We’re doing the right thing, and we hear that all the time from our constituents,” McGuire told Radio IQ.
Stanley disagrees: “I think it does not affect Republicans in the long term because what we’re doing is fighting for people’s rights.”
Voters will decide next year when all 140 legislative seats are up for grabs.
