The Republican Party’s 2024 platform makes little mention of gun rights or the Second Amendment beyond saying that the party would protect “THE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS.” Despite that, the issue remains central to the upcoming elections, and many Republican politicians continue to campaign heavily on it.
Gun violence and gun safety were essential talking points in Tuesday’s vice-presidential debate between Democratic Gov. Tim Walz of Minnesota and Republican Ohio Sen. JD Vance.
Asked about what he would do to curb gun deaths among children and teens, Vance, who the moderators noted opposes red flag laws and semi-automatic rifle bans, answered that schools should be hardened as targets for mass shootings.
“We have to increase security in our schools. We have to make the doors lock better. We have to make the doors stronger. We’ve got to make the windows stronger,” he said. “And of course, we’ve got to increase school resource officers because the idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it just doesn’t fit with recent experience.”
On the issue of whether parents should be held responsible for contributing to a shooting by their children, he said, “I certainly trust local law enforcement and local authorities to make those decisions.”
Republican voters seem to share the opinions of their elected officials. A 2024 poll from the Pew Research Center found that 40% of supporters of former President Donald Trump said that “An increase in the number of guns in the United States is good for society,” and 86% said that “Gun ownership does more to increase safety by allowing law-abiding citizens to protect themselves” than “Reduce safety by giving too many people access to firearms and increasing misuse.”
The poll also found that 27% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said that gun violence “is a very big problem,” compared to 68% of Democratic and Democratic-leaning independent voters.
At the Gun Owners Advocacy and Leadership Summit in Knoxville in August, Trump underlined the centrality of opposition to firearm regulations to the party’s base, The Trace reported. He falsely claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris, who is a gun owner along with Walz, was a “gun grabber.”
President Biden signed a bipartisan gun safety bill into law in 2022, which encouraged states to pass red flag laws, banned convicted domestic abusers from owning guns, and expanded background checks for those under 21.
Conservative support of gun rights extends beyond elected officials. The U.S. Supreme Court, with a conservative majority cemented by former President Donald Trump’s appointments, struck down a concealed carry restriction in New York in 2023 and overturned a ban on bump stocks earlier this year.
The issue of gun rights is “something that’s very important to us, from a campaign standpoint and an issue standpoint,” Trump campaign co-manager and Republican strategist Chris LaCivita said at an event sponsored by the U.S. Concealed Carry Association at the Republican National Convention in July, according to reporting from Salon. LaCivita said that strengthening a conservative majority in the judiciary, which is favorable to weakening gun safety laws, was his goal.
“Allowing law-abiding citizens to carry their firearms and to protect themselves and to protect their families… that’s an issue that will always be an important one for the Republican Party.”
