Gun Research Will Get Even More Difficult Under NRA-Friendly Trump

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Publish Date:
January 31, 2017
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Wired
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Summary

Gun violence research is notoriously hard to fund. Since 1996, when a National Rifle Association-pressured Congress pulled all Centers for Disease Control and Prevention funding for gun-related research, UC Davis epidemiologist Garen Wintemute has shelled out over $1 million of his own money to keep his Violence Prevention Research Program going. That investment has paid off; 20 years later, the UC Davis program is one of the best in the country, and this week published a study finding registered California gun owners with a DUI or other alcohol-related crime on their record are four to five times more likely to be arrested for crimes involving a firearm.

That data might be a long time coming. Trump’s team is much cozier with the NRA than the Obama administration had been, which has emboldened them to pursue a more aggressive agenda. “They are pushing for a national reciprocity law that says if you’ve got a gun permit in any state, you can take that gun anywhere in the country,” says John Donohue, a professor of law and economist at Stanford University who studies gun policy. That’s bad news for gun control-friendly states like California and New York, and for reputable researchers. “The federal government probably will not fund any research, unless they throw money to people who they know will come out with some NRA-sponsored conclusion,” says Donohue.

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