Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence

We believe the enactment and implementation of gun safety laws will have impact because we have empirical evidence to prove it. We refer to California as a model for the nation because of the tremendous success we've had in the state. In 1993, when the Giffords Law Center was founded (as The Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence), 5,500 Californians died each year to gun violence. At the time, California’s gun laws were relatively weak and the state’s gun death rate was substantially higher than the national average. Over the last 22 years, California has comprehensively strengthened its gun violence prevention laws under our leadership and reduced the gun death rate by nearly 60% – a rate over twice the national average. We know these compelling results are part of a larger trend. We conduct an extensive, 50-state analysis on the effectiveness of all enacted gun legislation and strategize accordingly, channeling resources to areas we believe are most viable and impactful. This analysis reinforces our belief in legislative action: through two of our key publications, Trendwatch and the Gun Law Scorecard, we're able to demonstrate the correlation between states who've passed measures to limit firearm access by dangerous people and declines in gun death rates. By focusing on enacting new Gun Violence Restraining Order (GVRO) laws and supporting their implementation, enacting protections for domestic violence victims, suicidal individuals, and children, and expanding the risk categories for background checks and prohibited people, we can demonstrate their efficacy and their cumulative impact and make a strong case for enacting them on a national scale.