by Dave Workman | Senior Editor
A Pew Research Center poll conducted in July shows widespread support for background checks, and a majority of Democrats backing a ban on so-called assault weapons while less than half of Republicans support such a ban, according to People-Press.org.
According to the Pew survey, 85 percent of Americans support expanded background checks. That includes 88 percent of Democrats and 79 percent of Republicans. By a wide margin (79 percent) they also support laws prohibiting mentally ill people from buying guns, and 70 percent overall support “the creation of a federal database to track all gun sales.”
Second Amendment activists might be alarmed to learn that support for making gun rights a priority over gun control has slipped since December. The new poll revealed that 50 percent of the respondents believe it is more important to control gun ownership. Forty-seven percent believe that it is more important to protect gun rights, but a majority of those supporting gun rights protection support expanded background checks.
The survey was taken July 14-20 among 2,002 adults.
There are definite partisan splits. Seventy percent of Democrats support banning so-called assault weapons, the poll said, but only 48 percent of identified Republicans favor the idea. But this is further dissected by Pew to show that 65 percent of women support a ban but only 48 percent of men do.
Among those with post-graduate college degrees, 72 percent support a ban but only 48 percent of those who only have a high school diploma or even less education favor a ban, the poll said. Fifty-seven percent of post-graduates think gun ownership puts people at risk, but 48 percent of college grads agree and 46 percent disagree.
Eighty-five percent of Democrats want a federal database tracking gun sales, while 55 percent of Republicans like that idea, the poll results said.
Another interesting finding was that 40 percent of the respondents think the National Rifle Association has too much influence over the nation’s gun laws, while 36 percent think they have the right level of influence and 17 percent think NRA doesn’t have enough influence. Breaking that down, however, reveals that only 13 percent of identified conservatives think NRA has too much influence, while a whopping 68 percent of liberal Democrats and those who lean Democrat think the NRA wields too much influence.
Sixty percent of men think owning a gun makes people safer while only 49 percent of women believe this. Republicans, the poll said, are almost twice as likely as Democrats to support this view at 74 to 36 percent, respectively.
Like all public opinion polling, the results are merely snapshots in time and depend on the questions asked as well as the tabulation of results. Thus, the latest poll shows a variation from the December snapshot taken by the same organization.
