The airwaves are filled with election issues, as both parties vie to gain the upper hand in the November elections. Democracy, the economy, and immigration appear to be top issues on people’s minds.
Though things can change quickly, one issue that seems to be flying under the radar this year is gun safety.
The recent attempt on Donald Trump’s life refocused some attention on guns, but it quickly dissipated once more pressing issues resurfaced. So, why does gun safety get so little attention as an election topic of concern?
Firearm deaths and injuries have been down over the last year. From the Gun Violence Archive, the pandemic years (2021 and 2022) experienced a surge in all types of firearm deaths and injuries. This included mass shootings (defined as four or more people killed or injured, excluding the shooter) and a subset of these events, mass murders (defined as four or more people killed, excluding the shooter).
The steady upward trend of firearm deaths and injuries since 2014 appears to be breaking, based on the data over the first half of 2024. If this new trend persists, the number of mass shootings may be down by as much as 20 percent compared to either 2022 or 2023. The number of mass murders will also be down by a similar percentage.
What typically attracts the most media attention is when children are killed or injured by firearms. These numbers are also on track to be down, by up to 20 percent.
Does this mean that gun safety has become a non-issue in our country? Absolutely not. Every person killed by a firearm is an avoidable death. And public safety demands that any actions that can reduce avoidable deaths should be topics ripe for discussion.
This is why the U.S. Department of Transportation has mandated numerous automobile safety features over the years, including seat belts and air bags, and more recently from auto manufacturers, such as collision warning systems, that ultimately save lives.
The challenge is that gun safety must compete with numerous other issues during election years. And with so many urgent topics on people’s minds, it is not currently attracting much attention in the mainstream media.
Of course, if there is a mass murder at a school in September or October before Election Day — something none of us want to see — the issue will immediately percolate to the top of people’s minds (including those running for office). The recent discussion of bump stocks, for instance, drew some attention, when the Supreme Court struck down the federal ban on bump stocks that had been approved by former President Trump.
Of course, just because the data are trending in a favorable direction does not mean that the problem has gone away or been solved. In absolute terms, over 8,500 people were killed with a firearm in homicides, murders, unintentionally, or in defensive gun use during the first half of 2024. That is over 46 people per day whose lives abruptly ended, negatively affecting family, friends, neighbors and co-workers of the deceased.
The best time to discuss gun safety is not in the aftermath of a mass murder, when emotions are high and people with contrasting and conflicting views dig into their positions, but now, when the data is showing a downward trend. That takes some of the visceral political heat out of the issue.
The recent shift in the data does not provide an explanation for why there are fewer firearm deaths and injuries. Establishing causality from observational data can be very challenging. It also does not provide any indication as to whether this trend will continue, reverse or stabilize. That is why data, even if useful in assessing where we have been, has its limits in predicting where we are heading.
This is also why both extreme factions in the gun debate — those who support untethered gun rights and those who wish to mandate universal gun bans — are not the right people to debate this issue, though they may also be the loudest and most vociferous in expressing their views.
The most sensible pathway forward is engaging people who reside in the middle ground, who value and respect firearms, who have owned or currently own firearms, and who understand their power and risks, with a vested interest in seeking policies that protect the most people from harm. Unfortunately, such people are rarely among the elected officials who have the power to effect positive change.
Should firearms be banned for all? Certainly not. Should firearms be available to anyone who wants them? Also, no, as the Supreme Court recently upheld.
Though firearm safety deserves its place as an election issue, unless some calamitous violent event involving guns occurs prior to Election Day, the likelihood of its climbing up the election issue ladder is small. That does not make it any less important. It does demonstrate the folly of how policies are crafted in this country, and why the very people who have the power to enact sensible policies may also be the people least qualified to do so.
Sheldon H. Jacobson, Ph.D., is a professor of computer science at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.