Veto the Permit-less Carry law. It will do nothing to make Tennesseans safer.
Surveys continue to find that a majority of gun owners believe they are safer with a gun in their homes. And many gun rights activists, supported by a long-standing narrative from the NRA, continue to argue that “a good guy with a gun” can save people from gun violence. But numerous studies have found that self-defensive gun use to prevent or combat violence is rare: A 2015 Harvard study, for example, found that people defended themselves with a gun in less than 1% of 14,000 crimes from 2007-11.
By contrast, research has shown that it’s far more likely a gun in the home will be used for suicide or homicide than for self-defense. One of the first was a landmark study published in the New England Journal of Medicine in 1993, which found that keeping a gun in the home was “strongly and independently associated” with an increased risk of homicide. The authors also found that people who keep guns in the home are three times more likely to be a homicide victim as people who do not.
More recently, a 2014 review of the research published in the Annals of Internal Medicine also found that access to firearms was associated with a doubled risk for homicide and a tripled risk for suicide. Don’t be part of the problem, Governor. Veto this bill and be part of helping to reduce gun violence and suicides in Tennessee. Your veto will make Tennesseans safer.
