More than nine million AR-15 rifles were manufactured for U.S. sales during Barack Obama’s presidency.
Those millions of ARs sold during the Obama administration alone provide background into why the rifles are so frequently described as “commonly owned semiautomatic firearms.”
The Wall Street Journal reports that the rifle was wildly popular during the Obama years because of its simplicity of use, the wide variety of accessories available for it, and the Democrats’ constant push to ban it from civilian ownership.
In total, “companies made 9.3 million AR-style and similar rifles in the U.S. for domestic sales from 2009 through 2016.” Only 2.1 million ARs were made for domestic sales during the 19 years leading up to Obama’s presidency.
And the love affair with ARs by no means ended when Obama left office. WSJ quotes the 2016 Shooter’s Bible Guide to AR-15s to show that “at least 143 companies” now make ARs, and that is “more than double the number of manufacturers from five years earlier.”
Moreover, ARs made up more than $2.5 billion of the overall $10 billion firearms market in the U.S. last year.
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News, the host of the Breitbart podcast Bullets with AWR Hawkins, and the writer/curator of Down Range with AWR Hawkins, a weekly newsletter focused on all things Second Amendment, also for Breitbart News. He is the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart.com. Sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange.