In Capitols and Courthouses, the national division over gun policy never ends

Less than a month after last year’s shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas killed 19 children and two teachers, the U.S. Senate passed the most important gun control bill since the long-expired federal ban on assault weapons.

On the same day, June 23, the Supreme Court overturned gun policies in jurisdictions with some of the country’s toughest laws, such as New York, Washington, D.C., and California, saying for the first time that people have the right to bear guns. to wear outdoors.

In a country already outraged by gun policies, the new law passed by Congress and the sweeping Supreme Court decision only intensified the national battle over guns, sparking new legal challenges and legislative debates in courts and state houses across the country .

And in the year since Uvalde — the deadliest school shooting since the massacre in Newtown, Conn. in 2012 – both sides of the issue have made gains and weathered setbacks as they attempt to define the role of guns in American life.

From Colorado to Michigan to New Jersey, gun control advocates have passed laws designed to restrict access to firearms or mitigate the fallout from the Supreme Court case, New York State Rifle & Pistol Association Inc. v. Bruen, to weaken.

Opponents have moved quickly to challenge many such restrictions, using Bruen as the basis for one lawsuit after another. And in states that were already gun-friendly, gun rights groups have been working to further expand gun access.

In April, Florida became the largest state next to Texas remove the permit requirementjoining the broad swath of the country where it has become easier than ever to carry a gun.

Even in the face of such striking changes, gun control advocates say their side is gaining ground. They point to a succession of legislative victories and to polls showing growing public support for some degree of regulation. That’s according to a poll released Wednesday by NPR, PBS and Marist College 60 percent of Americansincluding 4 in 10 who own guns consider it more important to control gun violence than to protect gun rights.

In the past week, Minnesota and Michigan became the 20th and 21st states to enact red flag laws to keep firearms out of the hands of people at risk of harming themselves or others. Last August in New York, the state established gun-free zones in sensitive areas such as Times Square. And in December, the New Jersey governor signed a long list of places where guns were not allowed.

Court challenges to some of those laws have been swift. In New York, a federal judge blocked parts of the law, but it remained in effect while the state appealed. And last week, a federal judge issued a preliminary injunction blocking many provisions of New Jersey law. The judge said the state cannot ban guns in many of the establishments enshrined in the new law, including bars, doctors’ offices and zoos, although private business owners may choose to do so.

Dudley Brown, the president of the National Association for Gun Rights, which opposes any restriction on gun ownership, said the Bruen decision was a bulwark against regulation and would help his organization win a large number of gun control lawsuits.

But he said even with the Bruen ruling, a monumental victory in the Supreme Court, the battle would drag on for years in the state legislatures and lower courts that must now interpret the decision. “It often feels like one step forward, two steps back,” he said.

Public opinion has long favored restricting access to guns, with the share of Americans saying that “laws affecting the sale of firearms should be made stricter,” rarely falling below half, according to Gallup. After the Uvalde shooting, the proportion rose to two-thirds of Americans.

And gun control advocates have learned from their defeats by organizing and building political infrastructure. “I worked in Congress for many years. I was never lobbied by a representative of any gun safety organization,” Peter Ambler said, referring to groups such as the one he now leads, the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, that support restricting access to firearms. Well, said Mr. Ambler, such organizations have public opinion on their side and influence on Capitol Hill.

Mass shootings have led to days of fervent protests, even in statehouses where gun rights have long been untouchable, such as Austin, Texas, where the families of Uvalde victims waited long hours to testify, and Nashville, where thousands of people clamored for a prohibition of assault weapons. a red flag law and other gun control measures after three adults and three children were fatally shot by an assailant at Covenant School in March.

Gun control advocates say red flag laws could prevent shootings like the one in Nashville, in which the suspect identified by police was undergoing treatment for an emotional disorder and had recently purchased seven guns.

But the legislature took no action other than expelling two Democratic lawmakers who took the protest to the chamber floor. Now Governor Bill Lee, a Republican, says he will call lawmakers to a special session in August to address public safety. “There is broad agreement that action is needed,” the governor said in a statement.

Even if such modest steps fail to yield results, gun regulation advocates see a glimmer of progress, as when Republicans on a Texas legislative committee voted to pass a bill to raise the minimum age for buying assault weapons, just to prevent that it reaches the floor.

“We’ve seen these rifts emerge among elected Republicans,” said Mr. Ambler. Proponents contrast today’s political calculus with another moment when a horrific shooting was met with demands for action: the Sandy Hook school shooting in Newtown.

A federal bill to expand background checks was defeated, with some Congressional Democrats breaking ranks to vote no. Last summer it was the other way around: 14 Republicans broke with their party to vote for the federal gun law, the so-called Bipartisan Safer Communities Act.

Some gun control advocates say efforts to make gun-carrying easier can go hand in hand with measures that keep guns out of the hands of those who want to do harm.

“Laws that actually use a scalpel to really identify risk, and laws that can prevent that risk from turning into chaos, are the most important things to focus on,” said John Feinblatt, the president of Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control group founded by Michael R. Bloomberg, the billionaire media mogul and former mayor of New York City. “This cannot be a referendum on gun control. This is a referendum on security.”