California laws would have ensnared Texas school gunman

With the nation reeling over another school-shooting massacre, the fierce debate over guns in America is again pointing to the strikingly different paths of California and Texas.

Texas recently eased gun laws that already were among the nation’s loosest. California, which has the country’s toughest gun laws, is poised to pile on even more. While Texas last year declared itself a Second Amendment “sanctuary state,” California is pursuing a bill that would would subject gun makers to lawsuits over weapons banned by the state.

“This state is leaning in,” Gov. Gavin Newsom said Wednesday as he joined fellow Democrats in the legislature in a bid to expedite a new package of gun laws introduced in February. “We mean business. We want to save lives.”

California still has its share of mass shootings, with three just this month, including last week in East Palo Alto where a shootout at a park killed one and injured three. But the gunman who slaughtered 19 school kids and two teachers in Uvalde couldn’t have walked into a sporting goods store in California shortly after turning 18 and left with a military-style AR-15 rifle, as he reportedly did in Texas. Many of the Golden State’s gun laws would have prohibited it.

“They haven’t prevented all acts of violence, but they have made a difference,” said Ari Freilich, state policy director for the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence.

For starters, following national outrage over the February 2018 high school massacre in Parkland, Florida, by a 19-year-old former student, California joined Florida in raising the age to legally buy “long guns” — rifles and shotguns — from 18 to 21.

That wasn’t lost on Dianne Feinstein, California’s senior U.S. Senator, who also noted the young age of the 18-year-old accused gunman in the May 14 shooting at a Buffalo, New York, supermarket that killed 10.

“Both teenage shooters would have been turned away at a bar,” Feinstein said Wednesday, calling on the Senate to pass her Age 21 Act, a bill to raise the minimum age nationally for purchasing assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines from 18 to 21. “But they were able to legally purchase one of the most deadly weapons available.”

Texas Gov. Greg Abbott said Wednesday that 18-year-olds have been allowed to buy guns in Texas for more than 60 years, long before the rash of recent school shootings.

“Why is it that for the majority of those 60 years we did not have school shootings, and why is it that we do now? The reality is, I do not know,” said Abbott, who is one of the scheduled speakers later this week when the National Rifle Association holds its conference in Houston. “One thing that has substantially changed is the status of mental health in our communities.”

Texas has taken some steps to address gun violence in recent years, making it a crime to lie on a gun-purchase background check, and Abbott said he signed laws to address school security and safety, including threat assessments.

But the Republican governor signed seven bills last June bolstering gun rights, including one for “a Second Amendment Sanctuary State . . . protecting Texans from new federal gun control regulations.” Other bills included allowing the so-called “constitutional carry” of firearms in public without a license, barring governments from banning gun sales in a disaster, allowing silencers and letting hotel guests store firearms in their rooms.

The age to legally buy a gun is hardly the only difference on firearms laws between deep Democrat blue California and Republican red Texas.

Assault weapons: The AR-15-style rifle the Uvalde gunman used — modeled after the military M-16 but limited to one shot per trigger pull — can’t legally be sold in California. California prohibits those so-called assault weapons as well as ammunition magazines for rifles and pistols that hold more than 10 rounds.

Red flag laws: California also has red flag laws that let law enforcement or concerned family members, employers or school officials ask a judge to temporarily disarm gun owners they believe to be threats to themselves or others. A recent study found California’s red flag law saved lives.

Abbott said Wednesday that there was no known mental health history of the gunman, and the only known signal he gave prior to his rampage were Facebook posts shortly beforehand. But it’s possible someone noticed something alarming earlier.

Waiting periods: California also has a 10-day waiting period for a buyer to take possession of a newly purchased firearm, while Texas has no waiting period. Florida, like Texas also led by Republicans, adopted a three-day waiting period after the Parkland shooting.

Background checks: California has universal background checks, which require all firearm transfers, whether at a gun show or even between friends, to go through a federally licensed firearm dealer who runs a background check. Florida and Texas don’t have such requirements — Democrats have pushed for a national requirement.

More California gun laws are on the way. On Tuesday, shortly after the Texas school shooting, the California Senate passed the bill modeled after Texas’ restrictive new abortion law that would subject firearm manufacturers and distributors to lawsuits over weapons banned by the state.