Cheddar Politics sat down with Joshua Horwitz, the co-director of the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at Johns Hopkins University, to talk about the two major developments in gun policy coming out of the Supreme Court and Congress.

Cheddar Politics

Gun Safety Policy Transformed by Supreme Court, Congress

Okay, welcome back to cheddar politics. Gun safety policy has been a field characterized by inaction for years, but just a week ago we got two big actions from two different co equal but separate branches of the federal government and they seem to be headed in very different directions. So joining us now to help break down all of these changes and how it affects gun violence prevention in the U. S. Is josh Horwitz, he's the co director of the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health. And I will tell you john Hopkins is in the best state of Maryland. Thank you for joining us, josh. I want to start with the bipartisan gun safety law because hey, why not start on a good note. You are more on the advocacy side over there at the Bloomberg school. So how much advocacy goes into getting something like this across and kind of just lay out for us why this is a big deal because it is a big deal. Sure, it's a very big deal. Thanks for having me. I'm really grateful to be here. You know, I've worked in this issue for a long time. I worked for advocacy groups for many years recently, my team moved to jOHNS Hopkins to marry advocacy and the research capabilities. This, you know, so I was around and watched the brady bill passed as part of that as part of the short lived assault weapons ban. I think this is probably the biggest piece of most major piece of legislation since then. Uh, and in many ways, much of some of what we saw is really decades in the making. I'm very involved and helped develop what is called the extreme risk protection order, people call it red flags. Um, that part of the legislation I was a part that I was deeply involved with and I can tell you that was a decade in the making. Um, and we were, we've been working, you know behind the scenes for many years to try to get this done. We believe for instance, one part of that bill is this funding that helps states implement these laws. We saw what happens in Buffalo when the law is not implemented. Well, we need these laws to be implemented. Well that temporarily remove firearms from people at risk. I can tell you the work that went into every section of this bill. It took years to put this all together. What I was most impressed about is that they could get it done and then they could bring so many republicans across the line. And that tells me is sort of from my advocacy hat about just how strong the polling was, even in red states about gun violence prevention. One of the things that I said in the wake of sort of the discussion around this bill is I feel like we've reached a devastating tipping point where enough members of Congress, enough members of the Senate have had a horrific mass shooting event that is based on race or was in a school or was focused on women in their state that they have now moved in this direction. And so I want to ask you a little bit about that. How has the increase or certainly the perceived increase of this type of violence changed the way that it's legislative change, that public perception? Because it does seem like this is a tipping point. Yeah, it does. I mean, I've been working in Congress as I mentioned for a while and to see people like john cornyn and lindsey Graham come over and work with us. Uh, I would say come over to meet us in the middle has been really something nothing short of remarkable given where some of those, some of those districts are you think of texas and south Carolina, but they've all been deeply affected by this. The polling is very strong in support of this. And I think something that's actually quite important to understand is that the N. R. A. Is not nearly as powerful as they used to be. Because you can only tell sort of like a big lie so many times. Oh, this won't happen because of more guns and more guns keep us safe. That's clearly not true in America, guns kept us safe. Will be the safest country in the world and we're not. And and you know, all over this country, we see the results of our, you know, easy access to firearms of failure to invest in systems. Um and so the, you know, centers from Red States are not immune from this. And, you know, I was in texas uh for a few days after Vivaldi and obviously people were very upset and even when cornyn got booed by his home state, you know, Republican committee, he still went forward and that was remarkable. I thought after I saw that tv clip, he's gonna step back, he's gonna lose his nerve. He just didn't and he didn't because people are demanding this all over the country. It's a really interesting shift. I think now we can talk about the gun safety bill without also talking about the Supreme Court's decision about guns in the brewing decision. The Supreme Court ruled the may issue laws I'm gonna get this wrong, so correct me if I'm wrong for, they ruled that those laws for gun licenses are unconstitutional, but said shall issue laws could pass constitutional muster. What's the difference, explain the difference to me? Because I have to tell you, I come from a father who is very pro Second Amendment, is very concerned about any restriction on rules. This was a big a big hit in his house. Not so much the bill passing right, Well, you mentioned that you think Maryland's a great state, one of the reasons they have a good, great state is because they have a robust and still carry requirement some something that's part of that is a good cause. So you actually need a reason to have a gun to carry it in public. Um New york has something similar to that. So there's some discretion involved there. Um In addition to some, what we call objective criteria is like a criminal record, what's your, you know, what what what is your, you know, what is it might be, have you had a commitment or something like that? A mental health commitment in the past, like there's a there's an objective standard and then in those states, that's a plus, why do you need this? Why do you need to carry this around in our community? What the Supreme Court said is in those states, which we call may issue states, you can no longer have that type of discretion, so you can't require a cause. And that's they went back to 17 70 said, oh well people carry guns around without any cause. So this is the way we have to live our lives now. So they've said that these states, well in new york, they struck down that law and in reality that means these approximately seven states are going to have to redo their, you know, change, change their law. Um But interesting, you think about your last guest roberts actually played an important role here because he and I believe Kavanaugh wrote a dissent that said, we are not calling into question, the other states shall issue laws even if they have robust testing and training requirements. And I think that's very important. That was his sort of she's the bad pun. But shot across the about the other conservative justices that says we're not going any further than this. Now, that's that's not great because it's still not great because the opinion is sweeping. But you could tell robert saying, please put the brakes on here. Now, that doesn't that doesn't give me a lot of for all the reasons you your last guest mentioned, he doesn't have that much power. And so it doesn't give me a lot of solace. And I think we're gonna have to fight this across the country based on the, you know, what they call text, history and tradition. That's thomas, read that extremely narrowly. So we're gonna sort of have to look at gun laws as they existed between 17 70 maybe, I don't know, 18 20 we don't even know you argue by analogy, that's no way to create law josh. I'm glad you mentioned that, because it looks like you may have to move from Congress over to the Supreme Court and figure out all of that. So it sounds like you've got it well under control. That's all the time. We have. I have, I have a million more questions. We'll have to have you back. Thank you so much to josh Horwitz for joining us. He's the co director of the Center for gun violence solutions at johns Hopkins University's Bloomberg School of Public Health.