The U.S. Supreme Court has declined to hear arguments on a Missouri law prohibiting police in the state from enforcing certain federal gun laws.

The law in question was passed by the Missouri Legislature in 2019, when Joe Biden was president and had signed the most sweeping gun violence bill in decades. Wary of increasing gun restrictions at the federal level, many Republican lawmakers championed the bill as a way to ensure that state and local officers in Missouri wouldn’t assist federal authorities in any gun enforcement efforts they might make.

The Missouri legislation imposed fines up to $50,000 for state and local officers who knowingly violated the law. When legal challenges were filed against the bill, a lower court found that it violated the Supremacy Clause — a section of the U.S. Constitution stating that federal law takes precedence over state law. This ruling placed a ban on enforcement of the law while the state and federal government fought it out through the appeals process. The Supreme Court’s refusal to hear arguments on the bill means that the lower court’s ruling stands.

The federal system of government employed in the U.S. often leads to healthy tugs-of-war between the state and federal governments. While settled law recognizes that the federal laws and the Constitution supersede those of the states, the federal government is also limited in the types of laws it’s allowed to pass. This often leads to legal wrangling when particular states disagree with actions taken by the federal government.

While this particular battle illustrates a Republican-controlled state wrestling with a Democratic president, the recent election has created a similar, yet reversed, dynamic. For instance, several Democrat-controlled states are currently wrestling with the now Republican-controlled federal government over their enforcement of federal immigration law.

As always, officers are encouraged to consult their agency’s legal counsel, since they’re still the ones caught in the middle of the lofty legal wrangling.