{"id":32988,"date":"2024-10-04T08:49:41","date_gmt":"2024-10-04T13:49:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=32988"},"modified":"2024-10-31T21:01:52","modified_gmt":"2024-11-01T02:01:52","slug":"what-is-the-republican-partys-stance-on-guns","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/?p=32988","title":{"rendered":"What is the Republican Party’s stance on guns?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The Republican Party\u2019s<\/u><\/a> 2024 platform makes little mention of gun rights or the Second Amendment beyond saying that the party would protect \u201cTHE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS.\u201d Despite that, the issue remains central to the upcoming elections, and many Republican politicians continue to campaign heavily on it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Gun violence and gun safety were essential talking points in Tuesday\u2019s vice-presidential debate<\/u><\/a> between Democratic Gov. Tim Walz<\/u><\/a> of Minnesota and Republican Ohio Sen. JD Vance<\/u><\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Asked about what he would do to curb gun deaths among children and teens, Vance, who the moderators noted opposes\u2002red flag laws<\/u><\/a> and semi-automatic rifle bans, answered that schools should be hardened<\/u><\/a> as targets for mass shootings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe have to increase security in our schools. We have to make the doors lock better. We have to make the doors stronger. We\u2019ve got to make the windows stronger,\u201d he said. \u201cAnd of course, we\u2019ve got to increase school resource officers<\/u><\/a> because the idea that we can magically wave a wand and take guns out of the hands of bad guys, it just doesn\u2019t fit with recent experience.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On the issue of whether parents should be held responsible for contributing to a shooting by their children, he said, \u201cI certainly trust\u00a0local law enforcement<\/u><\/a>\u00a0and local authorities to make those decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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<\/u><\/a> said that \u201cAn increase in the number of guns in the United States is good for society,\u201d and 86% said that \u201cGun ownership does more to increase safety by allowing law-abiding citizens to protect themselves\u201d than \u201cReduce safety by giving too many people access to firearms and increasing misuse.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The poll also found that 27% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents said that gun violence \u201cis a very big problem,\u201d compared to 68% of Democratic and Democratic-leaning independent voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At the Gun Owners Advocacy and Leadership Summit<\/u><\/a> in Knoxville in August, Trump underlined the centrality of opposition to firearm regulations to the party\u2019s base, The Trace reported. He falsely claimed that Vice President Kamala Harris<\/u><\/a>, who is a gun owner along with Walz, was a \u201cgun grabber.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

President Biden signed a bipartisan gun safety bill<\/u><\/a> 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Conservative support of gun rights extends beyond elected officials. The U.S. Supreme Court, with a conservative majority cemented by former President Donald Trump\u2019s appointments, struck down a concealed carry restriction<\/u><\/a> in New York in 2023 and overturned a ban on bump stocks earlier this year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The issue of gun rights is \u201csomething that\u2019s very important to us, from a campaign standpoint and an issue standpoint,\u201d 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.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAllowing law-abiding citizens to carry their firearms and to protect themselves and to protect their families\u2026 that\u2019s an issue that will always be an important one for the Republican Party.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

usatoday<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Republican Party\u2019s 2024 platform makes little mention of gun rights or the Second Amendment beyond saying that the party would protect \u201cTHE RIGHT TO KEEP AND BEAR ARMS.\u201d 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 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":32989,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1152],"tags":[2547,1580],"class_list":["post-32988","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-humanrights","tag-guns","tag-republicans"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32988","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32988"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32988\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32991,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32988\/revisions\/32991"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32989"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32988"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32988"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ustower.net\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32988"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}