Gun Ownership Booming Among Women, Minorities, Seniors

Hillary Clinton might be surprised to learn who the Americans are who top her “enemies” list.

While Clinton says the Supreme Court was “wrong” to define the Second Amendment as an individual right of self-defense, and while Democrats across the country join her campaign of attacking the right to keep and bear arms and disparaging those who stand up to protect it, Americans are buying firearms and applying for permits to carry them in greater numbers than ever. 

So, who’s responsible for those skyrocketing numbers? Just who exactly are those “enemies”? 

More and more, they’re the people Hillary Clinton takes for granted as votes already in her pocket: Minorities, women, and, to a lesser degree, senior citizens. Why? Probably because they know that when push comes to shove, the only one who can protect you is you. 

JaQuan Taylor, 22, is a senior at Georgia Tech. He’s black, and he’s a Democrat—but as he told The Daily Signal, he’s having misgivings now that Democrats have returned to their gun-ban gimmickry. “It’s more challenging for me to pick a politician that wants to take away guns or prohibit them in any way,” he said. “Since I’ve gotten a gun, I’ve begun to look at Republicans.”

And he’s far from alone. 

In the Democrat-dominated gun-control enclave of Massachusetts, Lynne Roberts of the Second Amendment Sisters said that demand among women for firearm training at a Braintree, Mass., shooting range has skyrocketed. Ten years ago, about five women per month requested training, but over the past year that number has grown to 35 women per month. If Hillary Clinton is successful, the Right to Carry—and the right to own any gun for self-protection—could face its sunset hours.

“Over the last two or three generations, self-defense and firearms were demonized,” Roberts explained to the Daily Signal. “Women were told they can’t take care of themselves. That’s changing.” 

And it’s changing for women of all ages: An ABC News poll in April found that among the issues that millennial women care about most, gun rights were just as important to them as equal pay and abortion. 

A study conducted by the Crime Prevention Research Center last month found that the number of right-to-carry permits has exploded at the national level, and even more so among minorities and women. As the study notes, “In eight states where we have data by gender, since 2012 the number of permits has increased by 161 percent for women and by 85 percent for men.” 

What’s more, the study found that between 2007 and 2015, the growth in the number of right-to-carry permits issued by state and local governments was about 75 percent higher among non-whites than whites. 

Indeed, a recent Pew Research survey found that minority groups’ attitudes toward firearms are changing. Among blacks, the number of respondents who said they view firearms as a form of protection increased by 9 percentage points, and among Hispanics, by 4 percentage points. 

Why? Maybe because minorities are disproportionately victimized by violent crime—and in many inner cities such as Chicago, the political class has abandoned the innocent to the lawless while cynically attacking the Second Amendment rights that the innocent depend on for their safety and peace of mind. 

And it’s not just the victimized, but also the vulnerable who are preparing for their personal safety. 

As the Kansas City Star reported, “People 65 and older make up one of the most solidly growing demographics” of gun owners. In fact, the number of older Americans taking basic firearm training courses from NRA-certified instructors has quadrupled since 2010. For the sake of comparison, the overall increase among all age groups for that same period was 265 percent. 

So what’s driving the national call-to-arms among women, minority groups and senior citizens in this country? 

Maybe they know that if Hillary Clinton is successful at stacking the Supreme Court with justices who share her view that the Second Amendment doesn’t guarantee an individual right of self-defense, then the right to carry could be as good as dead in this country, and the legality of all sorts of firearms—from semi-automatic rifles to handguns—could be in its sunset hours.

Whatever the reasons behind this national transformation, it’s clear that politicians who cynically demonize and attack the most fundamental freedoms of people who they take for granted as supporters could be in for a rude awakening on Election Day this year.