Devin Hughes had had enough of the conflict over guns. In April, the 27-year-old president of GVPedia (short for Gun Violence-Pedia, an online database of gun research) brought together more than 140 advocates, survivors, and academics to commemorate the Columbine High School massacre in Littleton, Colorado, 20 years prior. The conference was also meant to spark dialogue about ways to reduce the epidemic level of gun violence unfolding daily in America.
Recommendations from the gathering have now been compiled into a document known as the Denver Accord, which Hughes refers to as an “evidence-based road map” aimed at reducing gun violence.
Its four guiding principles are clear:
- Guns do not make us safer.
- Gun violence in America is a pervasive public health crisis that demands substantial policy solutions and well-funded programs that effectively reduce gun violence.
- Equitable and just enforcement of gun laws is paramount.
- Everyone has the right to live free from violence.
But those principles — the first one, in particular — are not shared by all. In Colorado, organizations such as Rocky Mountain Gun Owners and the Colorado State Shooting Association (the state affiliate of the National Rifle Association) have asserted that responsible gun ownership is fundamental to self defense. Some school districts in states such as Wyoming allow concealed carry in schools with the express goal of keeping students safe in the event of a shooting.
In 2019, 347 people have died in 312 mass shootings, and another 1,282 were injured, according to the Gun Violence Archive. After several high profile shootings occurred over the summer, including in El Paso and Odessa, Texas, and Gilroy, California, Democrats in Congress returned to session eager to pass a gun reform bill. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, though, has said President Donald Trump’s support is a requisite for that chamber to advance any gun-related legislation.
Mass shootings dominate the headlines, but gun violence has a far broader reach. In 2017, 39,673 people were killed by a firearm, and two-thirds of those deaths were by suicide, according to the most recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention data. Western states have the highest rates of both gun ownership and suicide.
Sixty-three percent of respondents to a recent Gallup poll said gun sale laws should be more strict, but the dividing line between them and those who don’t only seems to be growing more stark. Hughes, an investment firm manager who lives in Edmond, Oklahoma, hopes the Denver Accord will be the research-driven conversation starter that brings the two sides of the firearms debate closer together. The following interview with Hughes has been edited and condensed for clarity.
Bitterroot: What inspired you to start researching gun violence?
Hughes: Unlike many of the advocates, I have not lost anybody personally, in my family or otherwise, to gun violence. I was motivated by the Sandy Hook tragedy back in 2012 to start researching the topic, and then debunking a lot of the misinformation out there. I decided to found GVPedia as a resource for all of the academic literature on gun violence. We write white papers, fact sheets, and our own independent research on the academic body to find what of that research is most useful and best in terms of quality. So, basically, we are translating the body of academic knowledge for a general audience.
You’ve said that there is a lot of misinformation being spread about gun ownership in this country. What do you want people to know that you believe is not being shared?
Some of the best estimates indicate that having a firearm in the home doubles your risk of homicide and triples your risk of suicide. The second part is that oftentimes, in the discussion, there does seem to be a sense that there’s nothing we can do to prevent these tragedies, and that simply isn’t the case.
There are a plethora of laws out there that could — and have been shown to — make a difference. These policies that are in the Denver Accord wouldn’t take all the guns away or anything like that; they would encourage responsible gun ownership and make sure there are reasonable restrictions.
Based on your research and the body of information that you have compiled, what are “reasonable restrictions”?
For example, the Denver Accord calls for licensing. [A potential gun buyer would] have to go in front of law enforcement, get fingerprinted, undergo a comprehensive background check. You can attach training to that license. Once you have the license, then you’re able to purchase firearms. There have been studies that show such a permit-to-purchase system significantly reduces gun deaths when they are implemented in states.
Gun-reform activists have raised concerns about private sales. In your view, what can be done to make that process more secure?
There are a couple of different proposals. One is that all firearm sales have to go through a federally-licensed dealer who is required to do a background check. Another proposal is in line with licensing. So that way, if you’re engaged in a private sale, you can check to see if the other person in the transaction has a license, and that will tell you whether they’re allowed to purchase a firearm or not. So, it makes the process significantly easier for somebody to check whether the person actually can purchase a firearm, and it allows for easier enforcement. If you’re able to find somebody who never asked for a license or doesn’t check for licenses, it’s pretty clear that they’re trying to circumvent the law.
What about closing the so-called gun show loophole?
The gun show loophole is sort of a misnomer. It’s a small part of a significantly larger problem, which is the private sales loophole — which basically means that, if I want to sell a firearm directly to somebody else, we can set up a meeting in the parking lot of Walmart and 20 minutes later, I’ve sold the firearm to another person and no background check is required. Some academic studies find that approximately 20 percent of all firearm sales are done in this fashion.
You’ve been quite outspoken about the need for change in national gun laws. In your view, what is the primary problem with our firearm regulations?
It’s mostly that we aren’t passing the right types of laws, but also a large part of it is enforcing laws that we have on the books. For example, in Colorado, universal background checks were passed several years ago, and an academic study came out and found that the number of background checks wasn’t increasing in the state. And the reason why is about half of the sheriffs in the state decided that, ‘We don’t want to enforce this law.’ You have to have smart enforcement of the law, in addition to having the well-crafted law in the first place.
What have you observed from the pro-gun lobby in response to calls for reform?
The NRA likes to say that all we have to do is enforce the laws we already have on the books. [But] what they’ve done is made sure that those laws are filled with loopholes, and then they do everything to fight enforcement of those laws just so that they can then turn around and say, ‘You see? These laws don’t work after all.’
If we passed the law without the loopholes in the first place and properly enforce those laws, they would be more successful. We have seen in states that do work on enforcement and passing the proper laws that gun deaths are reduced.
What can you share about what’s happening around the country now, in terms of gun regulation and enforcement?
In several cases, we’ve gone backwards on the issue. The federal assault weapons ban, for example, expired [in 2004]. There really hasn’t been much movement, at least nationally, in terms of laws.
And then at the state level, we’ve also seen an explosion of “stand your ground” laws, which are harmful and increase deaths, particularly in minority communities. We’ve seen an explosion of concealed carry laws, and even permitless carry, which actually increased crime according to the best available evidence.
Now, there have been some bright spots and certain states where they have been able to pass meaningful gun reform. I do feel the tide is turning on the issue. It’s just been a couple of decades of being stalled, or even going backwards.
What is your ultimate goal?
The ultimate destination would be to have the Denver Accord policies proposed at a national level. GVPedia is a nonprofit organization, so we can’t endorse specific legislation. We can only point out that these are the laws that have been academically shown to save lives. By compiling all of that together and presenting it to lawmakers, they can then make an informed decision on how to proceed with that information.
And it’s not just for the lawmakers, but also for advocates and the general public as well, so they know what policies and programs are most effective at reducing gun violence and can start advocating for those programs themselves.
