Times Standard (Eureka)

Many back strict gun laws, but opposition tends to be louder

- By Hannah Fingerhut

WASHINGTON » Most U.S. adults think mass shootings would occur less often if guns were harder to get, and that schools and other public places have become less safe than they were two decades ago, polling shows.

Still, public attitudes on guns and gun policy are complicate­d, and the issue has seen little by way of federal legislativ­e changes in more than a decade. In the wake of Tuesday’s massacre at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, Democratic governors and lawmakers are pleading for gun restrictio­ns. Reforms will meet Republican resistance both in Congress and state legislatur­es and are unlikely to advance.

While it’s not unusual for polling to show higher support for restrictio­ns among the general public after a mass shooting, attitudes on gun regulation are overall rather stable over time, said John Roman, senior fellow at NORC at the University of Chicago.

In 2020, about half of voters in the presidenti­al election said U.S. gun laws should be made stricter, according to AP VoteCast, compared with about a third saying they should be left as they are and only about 1 in 10 saying they should be made less strict.

In March 2019, an APNORC poll showed most U.S. adults — 58% — saying they thought there would be fewer mass shootings in the U.S. if it were harder for people to legally obtain guns. Many specific measures that would curb access to guns or ammunition also get majority support, according to polls.

There is widespread agreement on one measure in particular: making private gun sales subject to background checks.

Attitudes on other gun policies vary starkly by partisansh­ip. New data from an AP-NORC poll conducted earlier in May shows 51% of U.S. adults favor a nationwide ban on the sale of AR15 rifles and similar semiautoma­tic weapons, while 32% are opposed. Seventyfiv­e percent of Democrats but just 27% of Republican­s were in favor.

Erica Martinez, 37, of Lincoln, Nebraska, said she was “horrified” and “irate” after Tuesday’s massacre.

“There’s just too many innocent little lives that are lost because this 18-yearold kid was able to just go and buy a gun,” she said.

 ?? ANDRES LEIGHTON — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE ?? Demonstrat­ors in El Paso, Texas, protest the visit of then-President Donald Trump to the border city after a mass shooting.
ANDRES LEIGHTON — THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILE Demonstrat­ors in El Paso, Texas, protest the visit of then-President Donald Trump to the border city after a mass shooting.

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