Everytown, Iowa Moms Demand Action Release Poll That Shows 88 Percent of Iowans Support Criminal Background Checks for All Gun Purchases

Poll Shows Overwhelming Majority of Iowans Support Current Law, Reject Gun Lobby’s Push to Repeal Background Check Law and Endanger Public Safety

Des Moines, IA – The Iowa Chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, part of Everytown for Gun Safety, today released a new poll paid for by Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund showing that an overwhelming majority of Iowans believes that people should be required to pass a criminal background check before purchasing a firearm.

The poll comes one month after the Iowa House passed H.F. 527, a dangerous bill that would repeal the criminal background check requirement for private handgun sales in Iowa. The bill’s backers have said H.F. 527 would increase the number of background checks that gun buyers undergo, but the Des Moines Register determined these claims to be “false,” and based on “questionable logic.”

Among the poll’s findings:

• 88 percent of Iowans support the criminal background check requirement for all gun purchases.
  
• 96 percent of Iowa households in which someone owns a gun support the criminal background check requirement for all gun purchases.
  
• 83 percent of Republicans and 91 percent of Democrats support the criminal background check requirement for all gun purchases.

“The poll shows that Iowans are united in their support of background checks to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people,” said Ellyn Grimm, a volunteer with the Iowa Chapter of Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America. “When our neighbors down in Missouri repealed background checks in 2007, that state’s firearm homicide rate rose by 25 percent. Let’s not make the same mistake.”