Alaska joins Supreme Court challenge to Maine’s three-day waiting period for gun purchases

By SUZANNE DOWNING

Oct. 1, 2026 – Alaska has joined a Montana-led coalition urging the US Supreme Court to hear a challenge to Maine’s mandatory 72-hour waiting period for firearm purchases, arguing that the government cannot separate the right to possess a firearm from the right to acquire one.

Acting Alaska Attorney General Cori Mills announced Alaska’s participation Sept. 28 in an amicus brief supporting the petitioners in Beckwith v. Frey.

“The Constitution acknowledges the rights of citizens to firearms, and it is incredibly clear that nothing shall stop the free exercise of those rights,” Mills said. “And yet, states like Maine have normalized making citizens wait to exercise the rights guaranteed to them by the Constitution.”

The Alaska Department of Law said its participation reflects the attorney general’s role in helping clarify constitutional protections for Alaskans and other Americans.

Maine’s law generally prohibits a seller from delivering a firearm until 72 hours after an agreement to purchase it. The waiting period applies even when the buyer passes a required background check immediately.

The measure took effect in August 2024, following the October 2023 mass shooting in Lewiston. Anti-gun advocates described it as a cooling-off period intended to reduce suicides and homicides associated with impulsive firearm purchases. The law includes exceptions for certain transactions and buyers.

Maine’s three-day delay is far from the longest firearm waiting period in the country. Minnesota generally requires a 30-day wait under its dealer transfer-report process for handguns and certain semiautomatic rifles, although local law enforcement can waive the delay and buyers with qualifying permits can bypass that process. Ordinary long guns are not covered by that rule.

The US Department of Justice sued Minnesota, Minneapolis, and St. Paul in September, alleging that the scheme—and still longer delays in practice—violates the Second Amendment. Hawaii, meanwhile, imposes a minimum 14-day wait through its permit-to-acquire process for firearms. These systems differ in scope, but each illustrates the broader legal dispute over government-imposed delays on acquiring arms.

A federal district court initially issued a preliminary injunction blocking enforcement of the Maine law. But on April 3, 2026, a three-judge panel of the US Court of Appeals for the First Circuit reversed that injunction, concluding that the law was likely constitutional and returning the case for further proceedings.

The panel distinguished acquiring a firearm from “keeping” and “bearing” one, reasoning that the waiting period regulates conduct preceding possession and therefore does not directly implicate the Second Amendment’s plain text.

Alaska and the other signatories reject that distinction. Their brief argues that taking possession is a necessary part of exercising the right to keep and bear arms. A mandatory delay, they contend, restricts possession even if it lasts only several days.

“Forcing a person to delay taking possession of a firearm is clearly ‘a restriction on possession,’” Alaska’s announcement states in describing the brief.

The coalition that Alaska joined also points out that Maine cannot justify its waiting period under the historical-tradition analysis required by the Supreme Court’s 2022 decision in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. The states contend that historical licensing and intoxication restrictions differ from a mandatory delay imposed on eligible purchasers who have already cleared a background check.

Montana Attorney General Austin Knudsen is leading the effort. Along with Alaska, the signatories include attorneys general from numerous other states and Republican representatives of the Arizona Legislature.

The Second Amendment Foundation and the National Rifle Association jointly submitted a separate brief supporting Supreme Court review.

The case, docketed as No. 26-258, was distributed Sept. 30 for the justices’ Oct. 16 conference.

As of Oct. 1, the Supreme Court had not decided whether to hear it. Alaska’s amicus filing presents its legal arguments in support of review but does not make the state an actual party to the lawsuit.