New statewide polling from the Texas Politics Project at the University of Texas at Austin shows that a majority of Texas voters support stronger gun safety laws. The latest poll measured a notable spike in support for stricter policies in the wake of the tragic shooting at Robb Elementary School in Uvalde, in which 19 elementary school students and two teachers were shot and killed.
Some notable findings from the poll include:
- 78 percent of voters support requiring background checks on all gun sales
- 66 percent of voters support red flag laws
- 52 percent of voters support stricter gun safety laws, up 9 percentage points from February; only 14 percent of respondents indicated support for loosening gun laws
Earlier this month, a Quinnipiac poll revealed similar findings, with a majority of respondents favoring stricter gun safety policies, including background checks for all gun buyers and raising the minimum age to purchase a firearm.
Despite this popular support for strengthening Texas’ gun laws, Texas Governor Greg Abbott and state lawmakers have worked to dismantle the state’s existing protections in recent years. Last year, over objections from gun safety advocates, gun violence survivors, law enforcement, and other key public safety stakeholders, the Texas legislature passed permitless carry, a dangerous policy that has been shown to increase gun violence in other states. And since the shooting in Uvalde, state leadership has once again failed to take any meaningful action on gun safety, instead calling for performative, do-nothing committees as communities across the state and across the country continue to suffer the deadly impacts of our gun violence crisis.
State leaders in Texas should honor the will of the public and take action to strengthen the state’s gun laws by repealing permitless carry, requiring background checks on all gun sales, passing red flag laws, regulating assault weapons and large-capacity magazines, and raising the age to purchase a gun.
And here are three things Governor Abbott can do right now:
- Keep guns out of the hands of those who pose a risk to themselves or others with actions to improve education on secure storage.
- Uplift community violence intervention programs that are already doing life-saving work in some of the communities most heavily impacted by gun violence.
- Hold the gun industry accountable for their role in the gun violence crisis.
