ATLANTA (AP) — Groups advocating stricter gun laws have built their political muscle through multiple elections, spurred by outcry over mass shootings in schools and other public places, not to mention the national situation. daily gun violence.
Today, gun control advocates and many Democrats see additional openings created by the hardline positions of the gun lobby and their supporters. most influential championformer president Donald Trump. They also point to controversies surrounding the National Rifle Association, which has experienced leadership shakeups and a decline in membership after a Former key executive found to have spent on private jet flights and accepted the vacations of the group’s sellers.
“It’s a false choice to suggest that you have to be for the Second Amendment or want to take guns away from everyone,” the vice president said. Kamala Harris said Friday in Maryland, where she spoke as part of a series of White House and campaign events focused on gun violence. President Joe Biden will speak Tuesday at a conference hosted by Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund.
Biden’s campaign says gun control could be a motivating issue for college-educated suburban women, who could be decisive in several key battlegrounds this fall. The campaign and its allies have already released clips of Trump saying: “We have to get over it” after an Iowa school shooting in January, then tell NRA members in May that he “did nothing” on guns during his presidency.
There have been 15 massacres so far in 2024, according to the data monitored by Associated Press. A massacre is defined as an attack in which four or more people die, not including the perpetrator, within a 24-hour period.
Asked for comment, Trump campaign officials pointed to the former president’s previous statements promising there would be no new gun regulations if he returned to the White House.
Trump has spoken twice this year at NRA events and was endorsed by the group in May. He alleged that Biden “has a 40-year history of trying to take guns out of the hands of law-abiding citizens.” His campaign and the Republican National Committee also announced the creation of a new “Gun Owners for Trump” coalition that includes gun rights activists and those who work in the gun industry.
About 7 in 10 college-educated women who voted in the 2022 midterm elections supported stricter gun control laws, although fewer than 1 in 10 named it as the top issue facing the country, according to AP VoteCast, a large survey of voters.
A AP-NORC survey conducted in August 2023 found that about 6 in 10 independent voters said they want stricter gun laws. Only about a third of Republicans wanted broader gun legislation, while about 9 in 10 Democrats favored it.
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