Maine’s 2024 reforms include expanding background checks, implementing a 72-hour waiting period for gun purchases, and making improvements to the state’s “yellow flag” law. However, the state still lacks fully universal background checks and a true “red flag” law, or Extreme Risk Protection Order (ERPO) law, and continues to allow the sale and use of bump stocks and similar devices that make guns even deadlier. Additionally, Maine passed a reckless permitless carry law in 2015 that allows residents to carry loaded, concealed handguns in public without a permit or background check.

In 2023, Maine had the twenty-fourth lowest gun death rate among the states. In an average year, 175 people die from gun violence in the state. That means that someone dies from gun violence every two days. Eighty-six percent of those deaths are gun suicides, and 11% are gun homicides. In Maine, the rate of gun deaths increased 49% from 2014 to 2023, compared to a 33% increase nationwide.