Annual Report: Change the Laws

Already, the Trump administration has taken a number of steps to roll back life-saving reforms. In just his first few weeks in office, Trump closed the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention and later cut billions in funding for research and community programs that had reduced gun violence. Since then, the administration has continually weakened federal oversight of negligent gun dealers, prioritized overriding a longstanding congressional prohibition on restoring gun rights to prohibited individuals, such as those convicted of felonies and domestic abuse, made silencers and machine gun conversion devices even easier to access, made it easier to export U.S. manufactured firearms to foreign countries, cut mental health and community violence intervention funding, and even terminated resources for veterans and suicide prevention.

At every step, Brady has called out the Trump administration and made sure these actions don’t go unnoticed. We have joined national protests, supported lawsuits, and mobilized legislators. But our efforts to counteract these deadly attacks are not possible without our generous donors.

It is only with your support that we have been able to examine options for legal recourse, work with partners and lawmakers to assess alternative paths, drive more than 55,000 calls and emails to officials in the administration, and continue to make gains in the states.

Conversion devices called forced reset triggers, which turn semi-automatic firearms into rapid-fire machine guns and which were previously heavily regulated, are now readily available to anyone under federal law — no background check required. These devices are now completely unregulated by the federal government and even available online for mail order. As part of the closed-door settlement, the Trump administration even agreed to return certain previously confiscated devices to the purchasers, unleashing deadly weapons across America.

But Brady is fighting back. In June, our legal team filed an amicus brief as part of supporting a multi-state lawsuit filed by 16 state attorneys general and the attorney general for Washington, D.C., that challenges the Trump administration’s move to return these deadly devices — a move we argue violates the law and poses a grave threat to public safety across the country.

Lives are on the line, and we will do everything in our power to ensure your safety is put before gun industry profits.
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"The ATF has classified devices using forced reset triggers as machine guns since the 1970s because they allow guns to fire at rates equal to or exceeding traditional machine guns — all with a single sustained trigger pull.

This rollback is both dangerous and extreme. Machine guns have been heavily regulated since 1934, and manufacturing of machine guns for civilians was banned completely in 1986, with support from the NRA."

In the dozens of states where Brady’s state policy team is hard at work, we drove thousands of messages to lawmakers urging them to vote to protect their communities from gun violence. 

Our Team ENOUGH youth advocates are also making their voices heard, leveraging skills they’ve learned through our Youth Advocacy Training Program to meet with legislators and discuss the impact of gun violence on young people in America and push for solutions to prevent it.

These efforts resulted in legislatures passing nearly 50 Brady priority bills this year, with 27 of those bills signed into law. Among these victories was the first-ever state firearms procurement law, passed in Colorado, to ensure taxpayer dollars are not used to purchase guns from negligent gun dealers, and a permit-to-purchase law in Washington State.

These tools allow concerned family members, law enforcement, and depending on the state, household members, health professionals, and school administrators to ask a court to temporarily keep guns away from a person who poses a threat to themselves or others.

Thanks to Brady’s work across the country, 21 states and Washington, D.C., enacted extreme risk laws, also known as “red flag laws.” Yet, despite strong evidence that ERPOs prevent gun suicides and other shootings, awareness of these life-saving tools remains dangerously low. That’s why we partnered with the Ad Council and the Illinois Department of Public Health to pilot a first-of-its-kind awareness campaign, called “Pause to Heal,” in Illinois in 2024. And we spent the past year expanding upon its success.

If we replicate Illinois’ success in even just a few of the states with ERPO laws, we could help hundreds of thousands of people protect their loved ones and prevent gun violence before it happens.

Already, we are in discussions with public officials and partners in several states about the resources needed to expand our “Pause to Heal campaign into their states. Because to truly prevent gun violence, we need more than legislation — we need education, awareness, and action so that individuals who are at risk and their loved ones can utilize the tools needed to save lives from preventable gun violence.

INNOVATION AND INCENTIVATION LEAD TO BUSINESS PRACTICES THAT REDUCE GUN VIOLENCE

You might be surprised to know the #1 purchaser of guns in America: Taxpayers.

Across the country, law enforcement agencies spend more than $5 billion a year on firearms. A groundbreaking investigation by Brady found that at least millions of these dollars have gone to gun dealers that have been cited for violations of federal gun laws — sometimes repeatedly.

The solution is clear: government agencies must properly vet all firearms vendors. This power allows them to incentivize responsible business practices among gun sellers vying for government contracts.

Since we first exposed this shocking problem in 2023, we have
been fighting to ensure states do just that. Working with grassroots activists and policymakers, we have helped enact five local ordinances throughout California. Over the past year, we had a major breakthrough when we led three states — California, Colorado, and New Jersey — in bringing forward the first-ever state bills to ensure responsible firearms procurement. In a huge victory this summer, Colorado became the first state in the country to pass such a law.

Especially as the Trump administration continues to weaken federal gun industry oversight, state and local solutions are crucial. This coming year, we will continue to push for responsible procurement in California and New Jersey, introduce legislation in priority states, and continue to advance similar solutions across local regions. The more states and cities we can help implement this common-sense reform, the safer our country will be.
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In the first-ever investigation of its kind, Brady identified 67 California law enforcement agencies that together purchased over $18 million worth of goods between Summer 2015 and Fall 2021 from a gun store that had been cited for over 40 violations of the law.

In 2016, Ashtian Barnes, a 24-year-old Black man, was shot and killed
by a police officer during a supposedly routine traffic stop. When Barnes’ mother brought an excessive force claim against the officer who killed her son, it was dismissed because of the “moment-of-threat” doctrine, a legal principle that has been used to shield police officers from accountability.

The Barnes family appealed, and Brady’s legal team took action to support their case before the Supreme Court in Barnes v. Felix. In a unanimous decision this past May, the Supreme Court rejected the dangerous “moment-of-threat” doctrine. Now, courts everywhere must assess the circumstances around an officer’s use of deadly force, not just the exact moment a trigger is pulled or a life is taken. This sea change will bolster de-escalation training by law enforcement agencies across the country and help ensure that use of force is proportionate to actual risk — key to building community trust in policing.