Fewer than one in five U.S. Latinos keep guns in their homes, and an even smaller share have used them to hunt or fire them for any reason, according to a new Axios-Ipsos Latino Poll in partnership with Noticias Telemundo.
Why it matters: The results offer a rare window into the firearms culture among groups of Hispanics, and come a month after a gunman killed 19 children and two adults in the largely Mexican-American city of Uvalde, Texas.
- 93% of the 1,018 U.S. Latino adults surveyed said they support requiring background checks for gun purchases, while 82% support so-called red flag laws.
The big picture: Last week, President Biden signed into law the first significant gun control legislation in decades.
- The law includes enhanced background checks for those under 21, funding for mental health and school safety, incentives for states to implement red flag laws and limits on the "boyfriend loophole."
By the numbers: 17% of the survey respondents said they have guns in their homes or garages — and about two-thirds of those said the guns belong to them personally.
- That compared with overall U.S. figures of around 40% who have said they have guns in their homes, according to various studies and surveys.
- Only 7% of Latinos said they've gone hunting or game shooting, the poll found.
- Around 14% said they've shot or used a gun in any circumstances.
- 23% of Puerto Ricans said they had a gun in their homes, compared with 18% of Mexican Americans and 17% of other Latino groups.
Yes, but: Nearly 40% of gun retailers saw an increase of U.S. Latinos purchasing firearms in 2021, a survey by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the firearm industry trade association, found.
- Latinos purchased firearms in 2020 at a 49% higher rate than they did in 2019, NSSF said.
Methodology: This Axios/Ipsos Latino Poll, in partnership with Noticias Telemundo, was conducted June 9-18 by Ipsos' KnowledgePanel®. This poll is based on a nationally representative probability sample of 1,018 Hispanic/Latino adults age 18 or older.
The margin of sampling error is ±3.7 percentage points at the 95% confidence level, for results based on the entire sample.
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