USA Today is tracking background checks thus far in 2019, and notes this year could witness an all-time record for the number of background checks conducted.
On November 15, Breitbart News reported checks run via the National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) were at all-new highs during the months of August, September, and October 2019. And the FBI shows the total number of checks January 2019 through October 2019 as 22,858,104.
USA Today reports that the record for most NICS checks in one year is 27.5 million. This means American gun buyers could break that record in 2019, especially when you consider that Black Friday sales will be part of November 2019 background check figures.
In 2017 there were 203,086 background checks on Black Friday alone.
National Shooting Sports Foundation general counsel Larry Keane noted the anti-gun vitriol of Democrat presidential hopefuls is a driving factor in gun sales at this point, and the addition of gun control candidates like Michael Bloomberg will likely the sales higher.
Keane said, “There is such a stark contrast between the two (parties), guns will be just as important in 2020 as they were in 2016.”
AWR Hawkins is an award-winning Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News 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.