As we approach 60 consecutive months of more than a million gun sales, it’s time to review the state of gun ownership in America, and enjoy the tears of anti-liberty/gun cracktivists.

According to a report by the National Sports Shooting Foundation (NSSF), the number of people who became first-time gun owners since 2020 has reportedly grown to over 22.3 million people, or the population of Florida.

Graphic: KelTec CMR30. Author.

Keep in mind every federal background check prior to purchase, can account for more than one gun. Why would so many Americans become new gun owners? In a word: Democrat/socialist/communist (D/s/c) policies: 

*Particularly in blue states, crime is rampant, with D/s/cs persecuting victims and supporting criminals.

*Americans are realizing the police have no legal duty to protect anyone.  

*There are fewer police officers than ever, and they’re afraid to do their jobs for fear of being prosecuted.

*Government has squandered more than two centuries of citizen trust.

*Americans are now convinced of the two-tiered system of justice, aimed at suppressing and punishing them.

*Constant attacks on the First and Second Amendments have convinced Americans of the necessity and value of those liberties and of government’s determination to destroy them.

*Americans see a rapacious government determined to work its will against them regardless of the Constitution and the rule of law.

*Americans understand a government powerful enough to force them to drive vehicles they don’t want is powerful enough to do whatever it wants to them.

*Americans aren’t interested in eating bugs.

*Americans are becoming convinced their votes might mean nothing and are closely watching the 2024 elections for final confirmation.

*Americans fear they might be forced into a second civil war.

*Americans are becoming convinced they’re on their own and always have been. No one is responsible for their safety and lives, and the safety and lives of those they love, but them.

*Americans, regaining interest in reading the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and American history are realizing armed Americans are free Americans.  The Second Amendment really does secure every other individual right.

*D/s/c government wants to disarm Americans, so they want as many guns and as much ammo as they can get.

*Americans are beginning to imagine a time when guns equal survival and ammunition will be worth more than gold.

*Americans watch Joe Biden brag about ignoring the Supreme Court and understand what that means for them.

*Americans watch Joe Biden call them domestic terrorists and understand what that means for them.

*Americans watch the administrative state lawlessly impose unnecessary, tyrannical regulations and know they’re next.

*Americans see tens, even hundreds, of thousands of real terrorists pouring across our borders and understand we’re all first responders.

And the list goes on and on. It’s almost impossible to plumb the depths of Americans’ growing distrust, even hatred, of D/s/c government, so the gun-buying trend continues:

The 2024 figures aren’t finalized yet, but so far there have been just north of 6 million, the NSSF said, citing the total FBI National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) verifications processed for the sale of a firearm.

June has just begun, and the trend of more than a million new gun sales each month continues apace. 

As I recently noted in Why I carry a handgun, 2024, Americans are free men and women. Keeping and bearing arms is their tradition and heritage, a heritage many are, for the first time, rediscovering and embracing. Article IV, section 4 of the Constitution states: 

The United States shall guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government, and shall protect each of them against Invasion; and on Application of the Legislature, or of the Executive (when the Legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.

Graphic: Colt AR-15 variant. Author

It’s a heritage that very well may be called upon to destroy, once and for all, “our democracy,” which is actually a tyranny of the majority, in favor of preserving the representative republic our Constitution guarantees every American.  Seeing uncontrolled invasion of America, and out of control crime, Americans increasingly understand upholding the Constitution and rule of law is up to them.

In so many of those new American gun owners, black, Hispanic, female, gay, lesbian, men and women of all socioeconomic stations, Americans see themselves as the new generation of Minutemen, Americans willing and able to defend our republic at need. What so horrifies D/s/cs is they see it too. Will that be enough to prevent a second civil war?

As the 2024 elections approach, Americans will continue to buy more than a million guns a month—more than five million more by November—all the while carefully watching to see if they’ll be necessary, as they were in the late 1700s, to preserve liberty.

Mike McDaniel is a USAF veteran, classically trained musician, Japanese and European fencer, life-long athlete, firearm instructor, retired police officer and high school and college English teacher. He is a published author and blogger. His home blog is Stately McDaniel Manor.