Debunking Charlie Kirk (and Turning Point) on Gun Control

Turning Point, the organization founded and run by Charlie Kirk, is a strong advocate for gun owners, gun rights, and gun-related policies like “campus carry.”

Turning Point published a pamphlet in 2016 called “The Case Against Gun Control.” It can be found here.

After another mass shooting, it is important to fact-check this group’s stance on guns.

Kirk wrote the forward. His main claim is: “Now more than ever, the right to bear arms is under attack and in danger of being altered significantly or removed entirely.” The book’s premise, repeated in the conclusion, echoes that: “There is an overwhelming amount of evidence that suggests gun control correlates with negative consequences.”

Kirk suggests “proponents of gun control are preying on raw emotions and using misleading statistics to push their agenda” and so then the book aims to respond to that and be “a clarification to the general public regarding the facts and statistics available based on empirical evidence.”

The book has several chapters, many I won’t cover. But overall, it is important to note a few things:

1. The endnotes show CNN and the New York Times as sources. Kirk has repeatedly used the term “fake news” to describe media outlets.
2. The conclusion states anti-gun advocates will “exploit tragedies and are willing to go to extreme measures to get what they want” and they “refuse to settle for anything short of total disarmament.” This is Turning Point’s attempt to sound reasonable or “objective.” It is a sweeping generalization trying to rebuke the “common sense gun reforms” noted by Obama.
3. Next Turning Point writes anti-gun advocates rely on “a passive, affirmative, and non-challenging climate toward change.” This is a strange and inaccurate description toward the gun debate seeing how there has been zero moves through federal legislation after several mass shootings for, in generic terms, fear of the gun lobby. And while states like Colorado have passed anti-gun measures after such shootings, some legislators have faced severe repercussions. And don’t forget the rash of “campus carry” laws and bills across the nation. Change has been happening in the other direction.
4. The premise that “things are happening” to end the Second Amendment is why Turning Points frames the need for its readers to be “proactive… while we have the ability to do so.” With the GOP in charge of the federal government and many states, this threat seems diminished. But still, ironically Turning Point, to throw its own words back at it, is “preying on raw emotions and using misleading statistics to push their agenda.”

In light of the recent shooting at a Florida high school, it is important to focus this fact-check on one chapter.

Gun Free Zones & Mass Shootings

The chapter criticizes politicians who offer condolences but then “politicize the tragedy” by talking about “gun control — including gun-free zones.”

While it does not define the term in its book, “gun-free zones” are the label Turning Point and others use to describe among other places school campuses, both K-12 and higher education, where non-law enforcement can’t carry guns. That is a key definition to keep in mind. No school or campus “gun-free zone” is actually a gun-free zone. Cops have guns, and, as gun advocates stress, there are untold number of people carrying guns illegally on campuses. [Politifact does a good job of summarizing the different definitions of the phrase here.]

For gun advocates repealing these “zones” is a key policy goal, especially after mass shootings. See this Feb. 15, 2018 USA Today op-ed in reaction to Parkland shooting. That op-ed states: “Killers continue targeting locations where guns are not allowed. Ninety-eight percent of public mass shootings in this country occur in gun-free zones — the Florida school being one of them.”

Turning Point repeats that same number: “However, between 1950 and 2016, 98.8% of mass public shootings occurred in gun-free zones.”

The stat comes from the favored scholar for gun advocates, John Lott, whose 1998 study More Guns, Less Crime is, according to TP, the “largest [study] ever conducted on the effects of gun control.” [It’s hard to fact-check that claim.] The book has its own Wikipedia page. It is canonical for gun advocates. Lott has his own website compiling his research.

There has been very strong series of criticisms of Lott’s work, both in the media and in higher education. I won’t re-litigate that. Here are some deep-dives that look at Lott’s issues: here, here, here. In general, Lott’s main claim has been that more guns (concealed, mostly) mean less crime. But the National Academies of Sciences concluded in 2005 that “no link between right-to-carry laws and changes in crime is apparent in the raw data.”

The basic premise of the stat for Turning Point uses is that more guns will stop gun fatalities inside these “gun-free zones.” And so the book then makes this argument in a hypothetical: “Imagine you are a criminal who wants to commit a heinous act. You are choosing a location that is an easy target. It comes down to a place where nobody is armed and a place where individuals may or may not be carrying a weapon. Which do you pick?”

The answer to Turning Point is “obvious,” (as are most forced binaries) but it gives data for its answer:

“Studies suggest that criminals are more likely to be deterred when they don’t know who is armed and who is not. Guns prevent an estimated 2.5 million crimes a year or 6,849 every day. 60% of convicted felons admitted that they avoided committing crimes when they knew the victim was armed. 40% of convicted felons admitted that they avoided committing crimes when they thought the victim might be armed.” [Bold words are original to TP.]

First, what are the studies mentioned in the first sentence? The source for the sentence is most likely a 1986 study of more than 1,800 felons in prison in ten states. The study is cited by many gun advocates.

Some “talking points” from the book — including the stat cited by Turning Point — can be found in a handout from the Firearms Coalition of Colorado made it seems for its state representatives. Much of the book’s data can be found in a 1985 National Institute of Justice report.

The book’s authors admit they have “very imperfect” evidence that “private firearms” deter crime, but have “ some evidence” (155). The authors then state their data helps them conclude that felons “are made nervous by the prospect of encountering an armed victim.”

In that NIJ report, the authors reported that 50 percent of felons surveyed said that they carried a gun to do their crime because there was a “very good” chance the victim might be armed. That study noted 34% of those felons had been “scared off, shot at, wounded or captured by an armed victim, at least once” (xiii). One should note that, as the book suggests, these criminals may be victimizing other criminals, who would, in all likelihood, carry firearms.

The study’s authors write later in the most important chapter in the 1986 book that “the possibility of greater damage [to the perpetrator] from armed victims is offset by the possibility that victims might not have their guns handy, might not want to use their guns if they had them at hand, or for some reason might not want to risk escalating an encounter into a full-scale shootout” (144). How “large the possibilities” of a victim having a gun is “unknown,” but they are higher for some groups and lower for others (other criminals, banks, store owners, etc) (144).

Whether those stats showed what Turning Point wanted them to show is debatable.

But then it writes: “If you take this controversial issue and think about it objectively — that is in a nonpartisan manner — even the most anti-gun advocates would admit that people killed in gun-free zones don’t have a way to protect themselves.” Again, the move toward “objectivity” is a key trend in this publication, even though Turning Point clearly has an agenda.

Let’s assume I am a “anti-gun advocate.” I don’t have to admit people killed in these zones have zero way to protect themselves. They have many. From barricading a door, hiding, throwing objects, jumping shooter from behind, and as many others have done, tackling the shooter. Or other people becoming shields. Like what happened at the high school in Parkland.

Turning Point’s next claim is also baseless: “There is no deterrent for criminals to commit crimes when they are certain their targets can’t defend themselves.”

There are plenty of deterrents. I am not an expert in what criminologists call “deterrence theory” but many studies have debated the effectiveness of deterrents, like heavier punishments. In fact, many of those issues were discussed in the 1986 study. Those deterrents of course exist when victims are not armed.

Some of these actions I mentioned protect myself and some protect myself and others. Notice how Turning Point defines methods of protection as only individualistic. There is no mention of community protection, i.e. the police, in this chapter.

Turning Point then lists, as of 2016, the seven “deadliest mass shootings in US history” and labels them all happening in “gun-free zones.”

Is that label accurate? See the Politifact link above.

But if we include the presence of armed guards, armed security, or off-duty police working as either, then no. Pulse had a uniformed Orlando police officer. He even exchanged fire with the gunman. There are others who had guns at the other locations, too. Virginia Tech, of course, had campus police. While the Aurora movie theater supposedly banned guns, there is no direct evidence, despite the claims of John Lott, that the shooter chose it because of that. And he was dressed to protect himself from being shot.

In the end, this chapter works on several shaky premises and a lack of definitions point to a weak claim of “objectivity” and being non-partisan. Turning Point again aims to hide behind such claims.