Poll: 86 percent of Americans support mandated background checks for gun ownership

[MUSIC PLAYING] EMILY BRIGHT: A strong majority of American adults support US Congress mandating background checks for all firearm sales and transfers. That's according to a national survey suggesting gun rights aren't as polarizing as we might think. That survey is from APM Research Lab, which is an investigative division within Minnesota Public Radio and the American Public Media Group. Managing Editor Craig Helmstetter is here with me now to break down the results. Welcome back, Craig.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Great to be here, Emily.

EMILY BRIGHT: Well, I'm looking forward to diving into this survey on Americans' views of gun policy. So what did you find?

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Yeah, these findings are hot off the press, just published today on mprnews.org and elsewhere. Even though the data were collected back in May, it took us some time because we wanted to take a real careful look at-- there's some open-ended and more qualitative findings that I hope we'll get to.

But before we do, I just want to remind the listeners that this was a scientific nationally representative survey. We talked to 1,000 adults from across the US. And this was conducted by our partners at Penn State's Mccourtney Institute for Democracy and a polling firm called YouGov.

So let's get to those top lines. We asked about four sets of gun policies that Congress might take. So how about this, Emily? How about you read the survey statement, and I'll give you the results? And then maybe we'll talk about some details afterwards.

EMILY BRIGHT: All right, so number one, background checks should be required for all firearm sales and transfers.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: The results there are what we, in the survey field, call an overwhelming majority. So 86% support universal background checks, 86%.

EMILY BRIGHT: OK. Number two, the United States should require gun owners to take a test, get a license, and register their firearms just like you do for your automobiles.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Again, there's lots of agreement here, 73%. Just about 3/4 of Americans supported this. And we'll call that gun licensing.

EMILY BRIGHT: All right, number three, the United States should ban the sale and private ownership of semiautomatic firearms referred to as assault weapons.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Here, again, there was a majority support, not quite as high, but 63% supported a ban on assault weapons.

EMILY BRIGHT: All right, and here's the fourth one. The United States should eliminate most current gun laws in order to protect Second Amendment rights. Now, Craig, I'm guessing there was maybe less agreement on this one.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Yeah, this was the only one not supported by a majority, but it was still close. 46% indicated support for eliminating most current gun laws. So to recap, we had majority support for the three provisions that would restrict guns in some way, while just under half supported what would seem to be the reverse-- eliminating most current gun laws.

EMILY BRIGHT: OK, gun policy always seems like one of those big divisive partisan issues with Republicans and Democrats having very different viewpoints. Did that survey find that to be the case?

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Well, yes and no. And probably more no than yes. So you and some of the listeners might be surprised to know that the two of the provisions that we pulled on were supported by a majority of Democrats as well as a majority of Republicans. So majorities of both parties supported universal background checks as well as gun licensing.

On the other hand, there was that partisan split when we got down to talking about an assault weapons ban. 90%, an overwhelming majority of Democrats support an assault weapons ban. But only 41% of Republicans support that idea. So there is a big partisan split on the one hand.

On the other hand, I said 41% supported it. So that's 2 in 5. That's not a small minority. Even though there's some disagreement there, there's still a fair amount of common ground, or you cannot assume that every Republican that you run into opposes an assault weapons ban.

EMILY BRIGHT: Yeah. OK, I'm with you so far.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Yeah, and to continue in that vein, there is also this partisan split in the statement that we should-- in the support for this statement about eliminating most current gun laws in order to protect the Second Amendment. Again, that was supported by a majority of Republicans, 54%, but only 34% of Democrats.

So there is a partisan split there. Not a majority of Democrats support that, but it's still one third of Democrats supporting strengthening Second Amendment rights. So, again, if you're assuming that a Democrat will be opposed to strengthening the Second Amendment, you would be wrong at least in one third of the cases when you're talking to Democrats.

EMILY BRIGHT: Underlying theme I'm hearing is don't make assumptions. So, Craig, we've been hearing a lot about gun violence both here in Minnesota and across the nation over the past few years. Can you tell me if opinions on these issues are changing?

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Yeah. Yeah, and, first, before we get into the survey results, I always like to-- as a researcher, we always want to check our perceptions. I have that perception as well that we've been hearing more and more about gun violence. But we wanted to check the data on that.

And, indeed, when we do look at the most recent CDC data, gun deaths are up over the past few years. Just looking within the past couple of years from 2019 to 2022, for example, the leading cause of death is suicide by gun. And that increased nationwide from 24,000 to just over 26,000, so a fairly substantial increase and a really substantial increase over that same time span in homicides. That leapt from 14,400 in 2019 to about 21,000 homicides in 2021, so anyway. So that's just to say the data does confirm the perception that there has been more gun violence.

And so how does that relate to attitudes getting back to the Mood of the Nation Poll? Well, I use 2019 as a point of comparison because that's the last time that we polled on these gun questions. And you know what we found?

EMILY BRIGHT: Oh, tell me.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: OK, well, despite this measurable increase in gun violence, there's been no real increase in levels of support for the three gun control measures in the poll. The universal background checks, the gun licensing, the assault weapons bans, those were all received the same levels of support in 2019 as we see today.

Somewhat surprisingly, the one thing that did budge is support for the Second Amendment, that statement about eliminating gun laws to strengthen the Second Amendment. Support for that statement increased by 10 percentage points. In 2019, 36% said that they wanted Congress to eliminate most gun laws, whereas today, that percentage has grown to 46%.

It looks like most of the movement has come among younger Americans. And there's been an increase in support for this statement among both Democrats and independents as well. So it didn't grow like wildfire. It's not like it converted-- like, everybody converted to supporting this statement. But a 10 percentage point shift, especially amidst this increase in gun violence, is notable.

EMILY BRIGHT: It is. So I know the Mood of the Nation Poll has these open-ended questions. We get to hear some people's opinions. Just brief me, can you get some examples of those?

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Sure. Yeah, well, since we were just talking about Second Amendment, we did follow up these questions by asking people to explain their reasoning on why they supported Second Amendment rights. And most commonly, people said stuff that related to gun ownership being a Second Amendment right, so it should be protected. Others said that current gun laws aren't working. Others said that they needed guns for their personal protection or personal safety.

So let me give you a couple of verbatim examples just as typed in by folks. Here is a quote from a 61-year-old Black woman from New York. She says, "There shouldn't be any gun laws to begin with because it is a constitutional right to bear arms."

Another example is from a 39-year-old white man from Colorado. He says, "All restrictions are a violation of the Second Amendment. As a rights maximalist, I do not believe the government has the authority to regulate arms."

EMILY BRIGHT: Well, Craig, I'd love to hear more about this, but we're running out of time. So I do want to direct people to-- well, have you direct people. Where can people read more about this survey?

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Oh, it's live on the home page at mprnews.org. Or they can come on over to apmresearchlab.org and find out even the gory details about the methodology and so on.

EMILY BRIGHT: I love it. Craig, thank you for your time.

CRAIG HELMSTETTER: Thank you. Craig Helmstetter is Managing Editor of the APM Research Lab. You can read more of those results, as he said, mprnews.org. And by the way, we did mention the increase in suicide. If you or someone you know is struggling, trained help is available. You can call or text 988 to be connected to a crisis counselor.