From the NSSF:

NSSF, the trade association for the firearm industry, updated retail survey-based estimates and concluded that nearly 5 million Americans purchased a firearm for the very first time in 2020. NSSF surveyed firearm retailers which reported that 40 percent of sales were conducted to purchasers who have never previously owned a firearm.

NSSF tracks the background checks associated with the sale of a firearm based on the FBI’s National Instant Background Check System (NICS). NSSF-adjusted NICS checks for January through July 2020 is a record 12.1 million, which is up 71.7 percent from the 7.1 million NSSF-adjusted NICS January through July 2019. This equates to nearly 5 million first-time gun owners in the first seven months of 2020.

“This is a tectonic shift in the firearm and ammunition industry marketplace and complete transformation of today’s gun-owning community,” said Lawrence G. Keane, NSSF Senior Vice President of General Counsel. “These first-time buyers represent a group of people who, until now, were agnostic regarding firearm ownership. That’s rapidly changing, and these Americans are taking hold of their God-given right to keep and bear arms and protect themselves and their loved ones.”

gun store counter
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NSSF surveys revealed that 58 percent of firearm purchases were among African American men and women, the largest increase of any demographic group. Women comprised 40 percent of first-time gun purchasers. Retailers noted that they are seeing a 95 percent increase in firearm sales and a 139 percent increase in ammunition sales over the same period in 2019.

Several factors are contributing to the sustained surge in firearm purchases. Sales spiked in March, with a record-setting 2.3 million NICS background checks conducted for a firearm sale, the same month the coronavirus pandemic struck. During this time, police warned response times would be tested while mayors and governors emptied prisons, including violent felons. Some of those were rearrested within days for committing another violent crime. After Memorial Day, protests turned to looting, riots and destruction, which continues today in several major metropolitan areas. Politically-charged calls to defund police also continue to spur sales.

This is also an election year and firearm sales typically rise during presidential election years. However, this year, Democratic candidates Joe Biden and U.S. Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) are calling for stringent gun control measures, including forcible confiscation, banning entire classes of firearms from lawful possession, licensing schemes and repealing the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act, which would expose the firearm industry to frivolous and harassing lawsuits.

Each month since March, NSSF-adjusted NICS background checks have set a record as the strongest ever recorded for that month.

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37 COMMENTS

  1. So. At least 75% of American households have at least one gun.

    Isn’t gun ownership supposed to be restricted to 10-12 ofwg’s that will die in the next year or so?

    • Many households have guns but will never admit to it…and that’s fine if they are not prohibited persons…
      and I’ll bet many family members have no clue another family member has a gun

        • That’s a nice sentiment, and is in keeping with an Absolutist understanding of the 2nd Amendment.

          But, is it realistic? Is it really a form of legalistic societal suicide pact, a Libertarian nicety that doesn’t hold up under scrutiny? Is it possible for there to be absolutely, positively, irrefutably NO ‘infringement’ upon any American’s right to ‘bear arms’? Did the Founders intend that half-wit sociopaths have muskets, too, right along with the Minutemen? Did they really mean ‘The People’ to be those sane, sober, controlled men who went to confront British regular troops, or literally everyone above ground, no matter their character, mental ability, or politics?

          Let’s hypothesize. Your next-door neighbor’s adult son is a barely-functioning illiterate semi-moron with psychopathic tendencies and a habit of killing small animals. He has never been adjudicated insane, has never been arrested OR jailed, has never been in a mental institution–if in fact any of that matters except the ‘jail’ part. Should he have a firearm? By your Absolutist standard, yes, he should.

          You are driving down a city street, and come across an AntiFa barricade manned by dedicated revolutionaries armed with rifles. Do you feel comfortable with them having those firearms? At what point, considering that they’re not in jail, should they cease to be able to threaten you with a firearm? Is it right at the moment they put a few bullets through your windshield? They’re still not in jail yet, mind. Your answer? “Of course! They’re not in jail, are they? People dedicated to the violent overthrow of my way of life, threatening me with deadly force, have a RIGHT not to be prohibited!’ Of course, after they’re in JAIL, and you are dead, at least they’ll have become ‘prohibited.’ That’ll be very comforting, I’m sure.

          Enuf, Miner49er, and Chief Censor all have firearms. None are in jail. Do you really believe that they can be trusted with them? Given what you know of them, do you want them to have lethal instruments at their disposal?

          OK, that last one was a cheap shot. Of COURSE they can’t be trusted with firearms.

          But, how about the other ones? Simply saying that no one who ‘isn’t in jail should be prohibited’ leaves an awful lot of leeway for an awful lot of people who shouldn’t have anything more dangerous than a tennis-ball with the fuzz shaved off to have guns. By your standard, for example, The Nameless Monster from Sandy Hook had a perfect right to possess his mom’s AR–he wasn’t in jail at the time he killed her and the rest of those folks, was he?

          What do you actually MEAN?

        • @Green Mtn. Boy – ack-shually it was the ’68 GCA that made felons “prohibited persons”.

        • @John in AK, do you also believe the concept of “innocent until proven guilty” is unjustified? Until and unless a person _proves_ (s)he can’t be trusted with a gun, then the right should not be infringed. Is it illegal for a “barely-functioning illiterate semi-moron with psychopathic tendencies and a habit of killing small animals” to vote? To be subject to illegal search and seizure? Why should the Second Amendment be singled out as requiring government permission for exercise when none of the other are? And, as the “dark ages” most adequately illustrated, gunpowder – nor guns – is certainly not needed to visit violence and mayhem on our fellows!

        • Aucontraire, I”m not necessarily ‘singling out’ the 2nd Amendment, in the context of who should be able to do what and who should not. Your example of voting is another area that sounds really good in principle but ma not stand logical scrutinmy. The 2nd Amendment IS, however, unique in what it entitles people to do: Physically possess devices that perform an awfully good job, among other things, of poking potentially lethal holes in people.

          It takes time, for example, for a lunatic’s vote to take effect and begin killing folks; Casting a ballot for Biden, for example, may take a few months, or even years, before its lethality becomes apparent. Giving a half-wit psychopath a loaded rifle, however, can have immediate and deleterious effect on bystanders.

          Sure, ‘all men are created equal’–under the law. We KNOW that they really aren’t ‘created equal’ in physical and mental actuality–otherwise, there would be no Democrats, for one example.

          As much as I’d like to agree with the principle that ‘everyone’ can possess a firearm, I have to stand with the fact that many should not.

        • John in AK, voting was merely the first thing that came to mind. Speech has also been known to cause almost instant death in various circumstances, but I know of no background check needed to speak. Some of the worst mass murders have been caused by fire – but I know of no prohibitions of same on even convicted felons. Literally _anyone_ can buy matches and gasoline without jumping through bureaucratic hoops. So, again, why are firearms treated so differently? There’s a huge push to ban semi-auto rifles, yet if everything worked exactly in the desired way, a complete ban on _all_ rifles would result in the temporary saving of perhaps 400 lives annually. (Always assuming some other method wouldn’t substitute.) The Second Amendment is perhaps the most transgressed of the entire Bill of Rights – why? (And, while voting may take longer, remember Adolf Hitler – to name just one – was _voted_ into power!)

          Please note I never said _everyone_ should possess firearms. What I said is that without contrary _proof_ of unsuitability, individuals should not be dispossessed of their right to be armed.

  2. It was Soros buying for his plantation boys…Gettin ready for more riots during Trumps 2021 inauguration day….

  4. New gun owners…or a lot of people with new guns?
    Maybe the form should ask if the person is a first-time purchaser…just for S&Gs…
    Just the last couple months I have purchased 4 pistols.

    • First-time gun buyers don’t keep it a secret when they walk into a gun store. Even if they tried, they can’t. LGS sales people can smell them.

      But with the overwhelming number of newbs, it can seem like everyone coming in is a newbie and proprietors might be tempted to overestimate based on perception.

  5. If the 58% of new gun buyers are African American that is a sign of a big crack forming in the wings of the Democrats. It is certainly not a sure thing but it shows a shaken faith in government one way or another. That is 7-8 percent roughly purchasing guns for the first time.

    They would be best to mind if they are not stupid. I have my doubts. Hopefully the Republicans gain some inertia.

  6. I think for the most part the “opiners” are reading these new gun owners wrong. It keeps being said that they do not anti-Demonrat make….but I would beg to differ. Ask yourself, “Why did they become new owners of a firearm?” Answer, Because they needed to worry about protecting them and theirs. So all the rhetoric and crap spewing from the left and the media was totally ignored when it became clear that “You are own your own”

    Just a guess but that to me says that at least a majority of the newbies are either voting against those that have been lying to them, about you don’t need a gun, call 911, it is too easy to get, no background check BS…on and on. It shows all the S**t that the lefties have been trying to feed them. I have met a few, who not only will not vote demonrat, but are voting for Orange man, they still don’t like him, but actually trust him more. The lies they have been fed, and believed so long, they have finally opened their eyes to it.

    There is hope my friends.

  7. “America Has Added 5 Million New Gun Owners in 2020”

    Now if they don’t vote against their freedom and liberty and the NSSF doesn’t sell our rights cheaply, like Oking red flag violations.

  8. Just cause someone bought a firearm does not make them your friend.
    Watch the video of a fool with a long gun shoot at a police vehicle in Kenosha, Wi.During the first civil war the north and south both bought guns from England..
    During the Revolution the Colonies bought from france, england’s enemy.
    Too many are making the mistake that a newbie is your friend.

    • Well that’s something to think about. But I think most of the newbie gunm owners are buying because they don’t want to get shot for lack of shooting back.

  9. Make that 5mil and one, my niece just got her a Glock. Here’s the rub on numbers of gunms sold. Nobody should be keeping track. The LGS should be the only one who knows it sold X amount this week, the manufactures should know they shipped X amount last month, but the government, well it should only know how many it sold as surplus. Does the government keep track of how many cans of pork and beans were sold last month. And if not, why not?

    • As a former government employee I can say in all honesty. The government keeps track of everything.Legal or otherwise. They have 10’s of thousands of people who do nothing but keep track of shit. They have thousands of people keeping track of the people keeping track of shit. They have hundreds of people managing the thousands of people who keep track on the 10’s of thousands of people keeping track. They have 10’s thousands of warehouses full of the lists of shit tracked. Not to mention all the shit they now keep in computer memory banks and clouds. If there is one thing the government is very good at. it’s keeping track of shit. Most of it’s meaningless drivel that lost it’s importance decades ago yet someone tracks it. So many people are tracking so much shit that they don’t even know what they are tracking or why. They were just told to track it. So if anyone believes for even 1 nano second that the government doesn’t know who bought what firearm from what store on what day and paid how much. You are a Damn Fool. It’s someone’s job to know and someone’s job to keep track of it. So when the powers that happen to be decide they want to know something. All they have to do is ask the person in charge of the people tracking the people keeping track and have the information brought over so they can do with it as they please. I know this was a long and convoluted example but, it is how the Government works.

  11. OK, great. We’ve added 5 million new gun owners in 2020.

    What percentage of these 5 million new gun owners will actually recognize the threat that ‘gun safety/control/sense/buzzword of the week’ poses to their ability to possess a firearm for protection or other reasons, and will accept that they simply cannot vote ‘Democrat’ as they probably have in the past and still keep that protective firearm?

    What percentage of the 5 million will STILL vote ‘Democrat’ even if their chosen party’s candidate/s appear on a live video feed into their living rooms gobbling down a live infant with some fava beans and a nice Chianti, simply because they are ‘Democrats’?

    How many of the 5 million do not believe that their Democratic Party would EVER take THEIR new gun, and feel that abortion-on-demand-for-mere-convenience-at-any-time-up-to-and-maybe-just-a-little-after-birth is FAR more important than any trivial ‘2nd Amendment’?

    How many are completely in favor, even now, of ‘buying back’ EBRs and other semi-fully-automatic assault weapons, at gunpoint if necessary, ‘for the children’? Will they not still firmly believe that THEY are ‘good people,’ and those that have those nasty black baby-killing machines are not?

    How many of these 5 million belong to AntiFa, or march with AntiFa, or cuddle up with BLM? How many of these new gun owners are confronting armored police vehicles in the streets? How many have figured out, as did the ‘loyal opposition’ in 1948 China, or 1917 Russia, or 1936 Spain, that one’s revolution isn’t going to get very far if YOUR side is armed with slogans and petunias, and THEIR side has rifles?

    Call me just a tad pessimistic, but I don’t believe those ‘5 million’ are going to make much of a positive difference.

  12. Let’s pretend that half the new gun owner vote against letting Biden and Harris take away their new toys.
    That is 2.5 million votes NOT cast for the Dems.
    That could easily be out margin of victory

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