Trump prepares to wipe out years of progress on gun violence

By the time Joe Biden became president in January 2021, guns were the top killer of children and teens in America, overtaking car crashes and cancer as the leading cause of death. As that trend continued, the Biden White House responded with gun safety policies to enforce existing laws and bolster gun-violence prevention programs. In June 2022, following mass shootings at a grocery store in Buffalo, NY, and an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, Congress passed gun legislation for the first time in three decades. The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act strengthened background checks for some gun buyers and prohibitions for domestic abusers, and it dedicated about $15 billion for states to build mental health and violence intervention programs. The Biden White House later established the Office of Gun Violence Prevention and an initiative to help states implement “red flag” laws that allow for removing guns from troubled people who pose a danger to themselves or others.

These policies at a broad level have coincided with a reduction in gun violence nationally: By 2024, shooting homicides overall were in steady decline throughout the country. Mass shootings also declined, both by conservative and broader measures of the problem.

Now, President Donald Trump has moved quickly to undo the progress made with gun safety policies. He shut down the Office of Gun Violence Prevention immediately after taking office. And on Feb. 7, he signed an executive order directing US Attorney General Pam Bondi to “examine all orders, regulations, guidance, plans, international agreements, and other actions of executive departments and agencies” from Biden’s term, to assess whether those “infringe on the Second Amendment rights” of Americans. Within 30 days, Bondi is to give Trump “a plan of action.”