Is soaring gun ownership among Democrats linked to US political polarization?

There has been a surge in the number of liberal Americans owning a firearm, according to new gun ownership data from the University of Chicago’s NORC research group cited by The Wall Street Journal.

According to WSJ, a world that has long been the domain of the white conservative male is being adopted by a growing number of Democrats who are ditching their scruples and getting themselves down to the local gun store.

Given this growing trend, it is hardly surprising that presidential candidate Kamala Harris has repeatedly drawn attention to how she and her running mate Tim Walz are both gun owners.

In fact, when Harris appeared on ‘Oprah Winfrey Thursday’ she told the audience, “I’m a gun owner too. If someone breaks into my house, they’re getting shot – I probably shouldn’t have said that,” she added.

Pew research notes that guns are deeply ingrained in American culture in a way that they are not in Europe. The Second Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees the right to bear arms and about a third of US adults say they personally own a gun.

Democrats were always less likely to be part of the American gun-toting tradition, with large swathes of this demographic advocating stricter gun control laws.

It’s a demographic that includes both progressives and minorities who would never have considered buying a gun five years ago, according to Jennifer Hubbard an anthropology professor at Lewis and Clark college in Portland Oregan, in WSJ.

Michael Ciemnoczolowski, a dyed in the wool Democrat from Iowa, interviewed by the news outlet, said that he was anxious about various unsettling trends that included a rise in armed right-wing extremists.

This chimes with what Professor Deana Rohlinger, a sociology professor at Florida State University, said in Newsweek – that rising gun ownership amongst Democrats could well be linked to the increasing political polarization in the US.

“For some, a gun purchase may be the result of their read on how increased political tensions and divisiveness in the US might play out,” Rohlinger told the news site.

“For others, it may be the result of individuals assessments of their personal safety in what they regard as a dangerous world. For example, LGBTQ+ individuals as well as religious and racial minorities might decide to purchase a gun for personal defense and so that they can feel safe.”

According to the WSJ, Democrats do in fact have a history of gun ownership but started moving away from the tradition in the early 1990s. So, in effect, they are “rediscovering” having a gun in their home.

The Democrat shift away from guns was triggered by “increasingly divisive political battles over the role of firearms in American society led the Democratic Party to become an advocate for gun regulation. Republicans became the party of gun rights,” according to WSJ.

Embracing gun ownership once again, 29% of Democrats or probable Democrats said they owned a gun in 2022 compared to 22% in 2010, according to the University of Chicago’s NORC research group.

An NBC poll taken in November 2023, found 41% of Democrats lived in a household with a gun – not necessarily owning it – up from 33% in a similar survey conducted in August 2019.

The same 2023 poll found that 66% of registered Republicans said they live with a firearm, against 64% in August 2019. Pew Research notes that Republican gun owners are more likely than Democratic owners to say their gun gives them a feeling of safety and enjoyment.

In a bid to explain the rise in Democrat gun ownership, National Rifle Association spokesperson Billy McLaughlin told Newsweek that Americans had been awakened “to the harsh reality that the responsibility to defend themselves and their family rests firmly in their own hands.”

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