Tracking Trump’s Disastrous Record on Guns
There’s four more years with Trump in the White House—so what’s he been doing about gun violence?
Donald Trump has said quite a bit on the issue of gun violence since his ride down the escalator in 2015.
Which makes sense—he was president during some of the worst mass shootings in American history, while gun homicides skyrocketed, and when guns became the number one killer of children.
During his first term, Trump alternated paying lip service to popular gun safety policies with NRA talking points. But actions speak louder than words, and Trump’s actions on guns as president consisted mainly of placating the gun lobby and making America less safe.
Eight years ago, modestly sized crowds watched as Trump was inaugurated for the first time. So much happened in the following four years, and much of his record on guns got buried under other news—so we’re here to remind everyone exactly what Trump did during his first term as president.
We’ll also be tracking what he does during the next four years. After all, he’s already bragged about doing nothing on guns, told the NRA that “no one will lay a finger on your firearms,” and promised to roll back Biden-era gun safety measures. GIFFORDS is going to be fighting back each and every step of the way—and we’ll keep this page updated as his second term unfolds.
Trump allowed fugitives to buy a gun—and then he purged 500,000 records from the background check system.
The Gun Control Act of 1968 declares that if a would-be gun buyer is legally considered a “fugitive from justice,” a gun dealer can’t sell a gun to that person. For the purposes of this law, the FBI considered anyone with an outstanding warrant to be a fugitive. In 2017, however, under Trump’s direction the FBI drastically narrowed the category of people who are legally barred from purchasing guns by declaring that only people who have crossed state lines to avoid prosecution are fugitives. He then purged 500,000 records from the federal background check system that identified fugitives who had been flagged as prohibited from purchasing guns.
Trump banned bump stocks in the short term so the Supreme Court could ensure they’re legal in the long term.
In 2017, a shooter used assault weapons and bump stocks—which allow a semiautomatic weapon to fire as quickly as an automatic—to carry out the worst mass shooting in modern American history at the Route 91 Harvest festival in Las Vegas. In response, Trump instructed the ATF to ban bump stocks, taking surprise action on gun safety. The ATF then proposed and published a rule categorizing guns with bump stocks as machine guns, making them illegal under federal law.
By doing so, however, he played right into the gun lobby’s hands. Some Republicans were reluctant for Congress to pass a law, despite bipartisan support to do so, because of opposition from far-right groups like Gun Owners for America and because laws are notoriously hard to repeal. Instead, they wanted temporary cover and praise for taking action after a horrific mass shooting without having to take an actual vote on gun legislation. After all, it was only a matter of time—perhaps due to their prodding—that the right-wing Supreme Court would take up and possibly reverse this ATF rule.
In 2024, the Supreme Court did just that—it recklessly undid this lifesaving ban and allowed automatic weapons back into civilian life, a decision that Trump quickly accepted.
Trump couldn’t stand up to the NRA on background checks and age limits.
After the mass shooting in Parkland in 2018, Trump attended a listening session with teachers and students where he promised to take strong action on background checks. In fact, he told a room of lawmakers “You’re scared of the NRA” during a televised meeting as he called for a comprehensive gun safety bill—one that included background checks and raising the age limit to buy assault rifles. Of course, he swiftly walked back his support for the latter after meeting privately with NRA officials.
Democrats took control of the House in 2019 and quickly passed both the Bipartisan Background Checks Act, which would expand federal background checks, and the Enhanced Background Checks Act of 2019, which would close the Charleston Loophole and extend the window for completing a background check from three to 10 days. Instead of following through on his promise, however, Trump threatened to veto these bills if they passed the Senate.
Just months later, Americans watched mass shootings claim the lives of 32 people in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio, leaving dozens more injured. Trump once again reversed his position on background checks, calling for strong legislation to address the issue—but offered no details on whether he’d veto similar bills to what had already been proposed.
Trump nominated 234 judges, including three right-wing Supreme Court justices, who have and will continue to shape this country’s judicial system for decades.
The most enduring legacy of Trump’s first—and possibly second—term will be just how many judges he appointed to lifetime positions. We’ve already seen the detrimental impact of these appointees, who have set significant legal precedents on gun and Second Amendment cases as well as many other life-or-death issues.
In fact, in 2022 the Supreme Court’s decision in Bruen, which announced a radical—and illogical—new framework for evaluating Second Amendment challenges, was only possible because of Trump’s picks for the Supreme Court. This decision immediately caused a wave of gun lobby challenges on gun laws nationwide, allowing ideologically driven judges to weaponize Bruen to strike down long-standing gun laws—which was always the plan.
Trump spoke at every single NRA convention while in office, repeatedly assuring the gun lobby that he would prioritize its policy goals.
In 2017, Trump became the first sitting president in more than 30 years to speak at the NRA’s annual convention. To no one’s surprise, he thanked the lobbying group for its $30 million in campaign contributions, saying, “You came through for me, and I am going to come through for you.” In 2018, shortly after he promised to take action on guns in wake of the Parkland shooting, he spoke at its annual convention once again—walking back his promise and declaring that “your Second Amendment rights are under siege, but they will never ever be under siege as long as I am your president.” And in 2019, amidst the infighting amongst leadership of the NRA, Trump called himself a champion of gun rights and used his speech as an opportunity to pull out of an international arms treaty.
Trump tried to make it easier for people to build ghost guns—homemade, untraceable firearms that are increasingly used in crimes.
In 2015, the Obama administration sued the ghost gun company Defense Distributed for publishing its blueprints for 3D-printed guns online. It argued that by doing so, Defense Distributed was facilitating the creation of dangerous ghost guns, which are typically undetectable and untraceable. Both a district and appellate court sided with the administration.
Once Trump was in office, however, Defense Distributed claimed that blocking these publications was a violation of free speech—and Trump abruptly settled the lawsuit and permitted the organization to continue publishing its blueprints. Fortunately, this decision was halted by an injunction after several state attorneys general filed suit against the State Department.
But this wasn’t the end. In January 2020, Trump decided to remove 3D-printed ghost guns and their technical data from the State Department’s weapons list and moved regulation to the Commerce Department. By doing so, he narrowed federal ghost gun guidance and made existing restrictions easy to evade.
Fortunately, the Biden administration took executive action to stem the flow of ghost guns into communities, including having ATF finalize a rule defining weapon parts kits as firearms and therefore making them subject to the same regulations—including serializing the parts and conducting background checks for every sale. This rule is being reviewed by the Supreme Court, and a decision is expected later this year.
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