Jeremy Kellogg, et al. v. Jonathan D. Nichols, Individually and as Statutory Licensing Officer Pursuant to Penal Law 265.00 (10); 400.00 et seq.

New York conditions the exercise of the Second Amendment right on a government license. In fifty-five of its sixty-two counties, the State assigns the power to grant or deny that license to a judge acting as a designated “licensing officer”; elsewhere, to a police commissioner or sheriff. In Whole Woman’s Health v. Jackson, 595 U.S. 30, 40 (2021), this Court reiterated the principle that “no case or controversy exists between a judge who adjudicates claims under a statute and a litigant who attacks the constitutionality of the statute” (cleaned up) (quoting Pulliam v. Allen, 466 U.S. 522, 538 n.18 (1984)). Drawing in part on its judicial-immunity precedent, the Second Circuit extended that principle to a judicial officer who administers the licensing scheme and personally denied the licenses sought, holding that Article III bars applicants’ § 1983 claims for prospective relief. This Court decided New York State Rifle & Pistol Ass’n v. Bruen, 597 U.S. 1 (2022), in a suit against such an officer. Six of the Second Circuit’s thirteen active judges dissented from the denial of rehearing en banc. The question presented is: Whether the rule that a judge who neutrally adjudicates claims under a statute is not adverse under Article III to a litigant who challenges that statute extends to a judicial officer who, in acting on license applications, personally administers the challenged regulatory scheme rather than resolving disputes between adverse parties.