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“The election of a Democratic president who has promised to tighten gun control laws could very well lead to increased demand for guns,” said Rommel Dionisio, CEO of Aegis Capital.
Dionisio says gun owners’ fears that Democrats will pass gun control legislation are fueling a predictable increase in sales before and after the election.
Firearms sales increased after the success of President Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012 campaigns. The previous record of 15.7 million guns sold in a calendar year was set in 2016, when a poll suggested Hillary Clinton would win the presidency, motivating many to stock up on guns , according to Mark Oliva, director of public affairs for the National Shooting. Sports Foundation, a trade group that tracks and analyzes gun sales.
Clinton made tougher gun control measures a central part of his 2016 campaign following the mass shooting at the North Charleston AME church in 2015. Obama tried unsuccessfully to convince Congress to pass stricter gun control measures following the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre in 2012. Former Democratic President Bill Clinton signed a historic assault gun ban into law in 1994, which expired 10 years later.
In contrast, President Trump’s upset polling day against Clinton was followed by a lull in arms purchases, dubbed the Trump Crisis.
FBI background checks related to the sale of firearms fell a record 8% in 2017. Earnings reported by Sturm Ruger, Vista, American exterior brand (AOBC)and the Winchester unit of Olin Corp. (OLN). minus a combined total of $ 610 million, or approximately 13%, year.
Gunsmith Remington Arms filed for bankruptcy in 2018, when industry sales fell a further 6.1%. But the gun industry rebounded in 2019, when 13.9 million guns were sold, according to Small Arms Analytics, an industrial research firm.
Oliva says the ongoing battle of Republicans and Democrats for control of the US Senate will likely play a central role in gun sales.
Georgian candidates for the US Senate are set to face two separate ballots in January after neither of them wins a majority on election day. If the Democrats manage to secure both seats, the party would have a 50-50 party split in the Senate as well as a majority in the House, make gun control legislation a possibility if Vice President Kamala Harris breaks a tie in the Senate.
“The industry is taking the Biden campaign at its word,” Oliva said.
Biden’s campaign and transition team did not immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday morning on his gun policy.
Gun sales have increased this year as Biden became the frontrunner to win the White House. But the industry has also been boosted by lockdowns from the Covid-19 pandemic from March. Americans fearing a potential crime wave and social unrest that erupted across the country after the police murder of George Floyd has forced many to buy guns for the first time.
Gun sales in 2020 hit an all-time high before Election Day after maintaining an unprecedented pace for most of the year. Oliva says October gun sales are up 60% from same month a year ago and more than 17 million guns have been sold in the first 10 months of 2020.
He expects the trend to continue through December.
“We are heading into the holidays and the hunting season, which are traditionally among the strongest months for gun sales,” Oliva told CNN Business.
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