According to Firearm Chronicles
A divided Supreme Court declared on Monday that a Second Amendment challenge to a New York City gun law was made moot by the city and state’s last minute move to change the law in question. The 6-3 ruling saw Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Brett Kavanaugh siding with the liberal wing of the court, while Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Neil Gorsuch dissented from the opinion, arguing that the decision “permits our docket to be manipulated in a way that should not be countenanced.” In an unsigned opinion, the majority opinion declared that once New York City had changed its law forbidding the transportation of legally owned pistols to any place other than a range in the city, the plaintiffs in essence won their case.
After we granted certiorari, the State of New York amended its firearm licensing statute, and the City amended the rule so that petitioners may now transport firearms to a second home or shooting range outside of the city, which is the precise relief that petitioners requested in the prayer for relief in their complaint. Petitioners’ claim for declaratory and injunctive relief with respect to the City’s old rule is therefore moot.
In a separate concurrence, Justice Kavanaugh agreed that the change by New York City and the state legislature mooted the case, but noted that he still has concerns that lower courts aren’t taking the Second Amendment seriously.
And I share JUSTICE ALITO’s concern that some federal and state courts may not be properly applying Heller and McDonald. The Court should address that issue soon, perhaps in one of the several Second Amendment cases with petitions for certiorari now pending before the Court.
In the dissenting opinion, Justices Alito, Gorsuch, and Thomas argued that despite the fact that the law in question had been changed, the Court still needed to weigh in on the issue.