Connecticut gun sale activity surges to 5-year high in 2021

NEWTOWN — Gun sale activity climbed to a fiveyear high in Connecticut in 2021, as gun purchasers rode a national wave of firearm-related buying that saw the second-highest number of background checks ever recorded by the FBI.

“These figures we’re seeing for background checks associated with the sale of a firearm would have been unthinkable just five years ago, yet this industry is meeting this growing demand,” said Mark Oliva, director for public affairs for the Newtownbased National Shooting Sports Foundation, the firearms industry trade association. “The future seems to be that firearm sales will continue to maintain a pace that is elevated from what was witnessed before 2020.”

Oliva is referring to a national trend of increasing gun ownership that’s fueled by concerns that police cannot keep people safe, and that gun control proposals touted by Democrats will restrict people’s Second Amendment freedoms.

In Connecticut, which passed some of the toughest gun reform legislation in the country after the 2012 massacre of 26 first graders and educators at Sandy Hook Elementary School, gun sale activity often trails the national trend.

But 2021 was different. State officials saw an early indication of the gun buying frenzy in Connecticut this summer, when an overwhelmed Department of Emergency Services and Public Protection launched an upgrade of its background check system that caused widespread delays and holds on gun sales, pistol permit applications and firearms transfers.

The gun-buying surge continued through the second half of the year.

“Increases in background checks were seen in states with very strict gun laws and elected officials favoring stricter gun control that would diminish the ability of law-abiding citizens to exercise their Second Amendment rights, and that includes Connecticut,” Oliva said on Tuesday. “Americans — including Connecticut residents — are quite literally voting with their wallets when it comes to lawful firearm ownership.”

The Southbury-based president of Connecticut’s largest gun owners group agreed.

“(Lawmakers) will frequently talk about Connecticut as the pinnacle of what gun control should be, but Connecticut residents don’t feel safe in their communities,” said Holly Sullivan, who has seen membership in the Connecticut Citizens Defense League grow 40 percent to 43,000 members in two years. “Connecticut residents continue to prove they want access to firearms.”

Final numbers posted Tuesday to the FBI’s National Instant Criminal Background Check System show that there were a total of 277,000 background checks in Connecticut in 2021.

To find a year with more background checks in Connecticut you have to go back to the presidential election year of 2016, when concern about gun control under a Democratic White House fueled 317,000 background checks.