The Andrew Branca Show

The night of February 18, 2023 a Colorado Deputy pulled over 28-year-old Brent Thompson, and sought to arrest him for suspected driving under the influence, and other charges. Thompson fled from the Deputy on foot, towards Interstate 25. The Deputy pursued, shouting commands. As Thompson stepped onto I25 the Deputy effectively TASERd Thompson, who fell to the roadway. Moments later, Thompson was s...

On August 9, 2023, a three-judge Federal Court of Appeals for the 5th Circuit reversed the conviction of Patrick Daniels, a habitual marijuana user who at trial had been found guilty of violating a federal statute making it a felony for unlawful users of drugs to be in possession of firearms. Daniels had been found with a pistol and rifle in his vehicle during a traffic stop. Following his convict...

This Law of Self Defense Show shares a couple of stories of citizens acting in defense of themselves against violent aggressors--but not merely as a simple act of self-defense, but also within the context of highly-defensible property. One of these cases involves a North Carolina woman who last week shot a man attempting to enter her vehicle following a road rage incident, and another involves a P...

This week saw the sentencing of former police officer Tou Thao over the in-custody death of #GeorgeFloyd on May 25, 2020. Thao is the final of the four police officers charged and persecuted over Floyd's death. Every facet of these persecutions has been little more than a legal travesty and racial lynching, given the utter lack of evidence that any of these officers caused Floyd's death...

Imagine this—you’re a non-commissioned officer in the US military, having served two prior tours in Afghanistan and having received military weapons training. You’re living with your wife in Metro Denver, a region plagued by car theft. At 11:20 PM on July 5 your wife observes two people stealing your car from in front of your home, and she calls 911. You retrieve a pistol and go outside to identif...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 7 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen .  This part 6 of the reading of Bruen covers the second half of the dissenting opinion written by Justice Breyer, with Justices Kagan and Sotomayor concurring. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written b...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 6 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen .  This part 6 of the reading of Bruen covers the first half of the dissenting opinion written by Justice Breyer, with Justices Kagan and Sotomayor concurring. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 5 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen .  This part 5 of the reading of Bruen covers the concurrence opinions by Justices Alito, Kavanaugh, and Barrett. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Clarence Thomas extending Heller&...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 4 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Clarence Thomas extending Heller's (2008) holding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to FE...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 3 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Clarence Thomas extending Heller's (2008) holding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to FE...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 2 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Clarence Thomas extending Heller's (2008) holding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to FE...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 1 of 7 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of New York State Rifle & Pistol Association (NYSRPA) v. Bruen. Bruen is the seminal 2022 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Clarence Thomas extending Heller's (2008) holding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to FE...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 2 of 2 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of McDonald v. Chicago . McDonald is the seminal 2010 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Samuel Alito extending the finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to the STATES and not merely to the Federal government (extending...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of part 1 of 2 of the 2010 US Supreme Court decision of McDonald v. Chicago . McDonald is the seminal 2010 Supreme Court decision written by the Justice Samuel Alito extending the finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an individual right to apply to the STATES and not merely to the Federal government (extending...

 today's show Attorney Andrew Branca reads part 4 of a 4-part reading of the 2008 US Supreme Court decision of DC v. Heller . Heller is the seminal Supreme Court decision written by the brilliant (now deceased) Justice Antonin Scalia, finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an INDIVIDUAL right, and not merely a "right" of some government militia, and thus no...

 today's show Attorney Andrew Branca reads part 3 of a 4-part reading of the 2008 US Supreme Court decision of DC v. Heller . Heller is the seminal Supreme Court decision written by the brilliant (now deceased) Justice Antonin Scalia, finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an INDIVIDUAL right, and not merely a "right" of some government militia, and thus no...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca reads part 2 of a 4-part reading of the 2008 US Supreme Court decision of DC v. Heller . Heller is the seminal Supreme Court decision written by the brilliant (now deceased) Justice Antonin Scalia, finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an INDIVIDUAL right, and not merely a "right" of some government militia, and thus...

In today's show Attorney Andrew Branca begins a reading of the 2008 US Supreme Court decision of DC v. Heller . Heller is the seminal Supreme Court decision finding that the Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is an INDIVIDUAL right, and not merely a "right" of some government militia, and thus not subject to whimsical infringement by the Federal government. As a result, th...

MEMBERS ONLY!  Is it possible to wait TOO LONG before defending yourself? It obviously is--and in today's show we share some use-of-force videos that illustrate that point, and document it for your records as part of the specialized knowledge that may inform your own decisions in self-defense.  Such documentation is critical to ensuring that this kind of specialized knowledge would be admissi...

Byrna is a company that manufactures various OC products for purposes of less-lethal self-defense ( Byrna.com ). Though I'm generally a fan of OC as a less-lethal self-defense options, I've for years had serious concerns about the product design choices made by Bryna--specifically, their production of less-lethal OC devices that closely resemble actual firearms. (Find all my aggregated p...

Today's Law of Self Defense Show brings us the great joy of debunking yet ANOTHER utterly trash "study" of defensive gun use out of Harvard--specifically, the Harvard School of Public Health. I'd like to thank gun-control advocate Rob McIntyre (probably a fake name, goes by @canucktunes on Twitter, with 104 followers) for bringing this trash study to my attention when he raised...

Less than two weeks ago the Missouri Court of Appeals handed down a decision involving a self-defense case where the defender was accused of having been the initial aggressor in the confrontation--and because of that accusation the jury was given a very damaging "initial aggressor" jury instruction. The result: CONVICTION. Now that convict appeals his conviction on the grounds that it wa...

Today's show briefs a use-of-force decision out of the Tennessee Supreme Court. Although the decision is from 2017, it covers a number of interesting use-of-force decisions. In a Stand-Your-Ground state, does being engaged in unlawful activity at the time of the event cost you ONLY your Stand-Your-Ground privilee, or does it lose you the entirety of self-defense? Who decides if you were engag...

In today's show (pre-recorded!) we cover NINE use-of-force events captured on video, and provide legal commentary and analysis on each of them.   The first five of these videos do not involve shots being fired, although some do involve guns, and this portion of the show is open-access (including the Law of Self Defense YouTube, Rumble, and Twitter channels): OC Spray Pot Shop Robbery Brought...

A Florida man recently emptied all 30 rounds from his AR rifle at his pool boy, and yet is facing no charges from the local Sheriff. WHAT IS THAT EVEN?!?!?! Join us for our plain-English legal analysis of this near tragedy (the pool boy fortunately suffered no life threatening injury), as we step through the detailed media debrief offered by the Sheriff's department to explain their no charge...