When NBC News released the stunning results of a new national poll showing 52 percent of American voters either own a gun or live in a household where someone else owns one, to get a full perspective about this rise in gun ownership requires a look at another poll released in September.
Pew Research revealed the overwhelming reason Americans own guns is for personal protection. According to that poll, “About three-quarters (72%) of gun owners say that protection is a major reason they own a gun. Considerably smaller shares say that a major reason they own a gun is for hunting (32%), for sport shooting (30%), as part of a gun collection (15%) or for their job (7%).”
Should anyone be surprised? When the public reads or views headline stories about loss of police manpower and rising homicides—Washington, DC recently posted its 248th slaying, while Baltimore reports 239 murders so far this year, and distant Seattle is expected to set a new record this year—there should be no wonder why more people are buying guns, including many people for the first time.
The New York Post recently covered the alarming exodus of police officers in New York City. The newspaper revealed, “A total of 2,516 NYPD cops have left so far this year, the fourth highest number in the past decade and 43% more than the 1,750 who hightailed it in 2018, before the pandemic and crime spikes hit the city, NYPD pension data show.”
Another revelation in the Pew poll that may create public relations problems for the gun prohibition lobby is that “Americans are evenly split over whether gun ownership does more to increase or decrease safety.” The polling firm says 49 percent of Americans believe owning a firearm “does more to increase safety by allowing law-abiding citizens to protect themselves.” While an equal number of survey respondents think owning a gun makes someone less safe, it is interesting how the numbers break down along political and residential lines.
According to Pew, 79 percent of Republicans say gun ownership increases safety, while 78 percent of Democrats believe it reduces safety. Among urban adults, 64 percent say gun ownership reduces safety, while 65 percent of rural adults say gun ownership increases safety. Pew said people living in suburban areas are “about evenly split.”
Alan Gottlieb, chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, noted in a statement reacting to the NBC poll, “We appear to be witnessing a significant change in how people look at gun ownership. We have all seen that the gun control and ban agenda has been an abject failure. Crime rates are up in many places. Restrictive gun laws have not disarmed criminals, only the law-abiding.”
Gottlieb has been a witness to this gun control failure. His office is located in Bellevue, Washington, a city just across Lake Washington from Seattle, where—as reported previously by Ammoland News on several occasions—gun control measures, specifically a special tax on firearm and ammunition sales inside the city, have accomplished literally less than nothing. The first year when this tax was in effect, the city logged only 19 homicides, according to Seattle Police Department data. So far this year, there have been 69 murders, matching a record set in 1994. With five weeks remaining in the year, the Jet City is almost certain to break that record.
Washington voters adopted two restrictive gun control initiatives, one in 2014 and the other in 2018. In 2015, the first year Initiative 594 was in effect, the state reported 209 homicides to the FBI Uniform Crime Report. Last year (2022), according to the annual crime report published by the Washington Association of Sheriffs and Police Chiefs, the body count was 394.
The availability of such data to the public serves to underscore why the majority of firearms purchases are for personal protection. One look at FBI National Instant Check System raw data shows background check numbers in the millions, and the National Shooting Sports Foundation’s adjusted number for October was the third-highest October on record.
According to NSSF, October was the 51st consecutive month in which the “adjusted” background check number relating to firearm transactions exceeded 1 million.
The good news: This continuing data shows gun prohibition lobbying groups are not winning as many hearts and minds as they might believe.
As CCRKBA’s Gottlieb put it, “It is no wonder Americans are falling back on the Second Amendment for personal and family safety.”
With recent court victories in California, Oregon, and Maryland, and a U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals decision striking down the ATF Final Rule on frames and receivers, there is cautious optimism in the firearms community the gun rights debate has turned a corner. Coupled with the Pew poll and last week’s NBC News revelation, the gun control movement just might be swimming against a stronger current.
RELATED:
About Dave Workman
Dave Workman is a senior editor at TheGunMag.com and Liberty Park Press, author of multiple books on the Right to Keep & Bear Arms, and formerly an NRA-certified firearms instructor.