Revised Gun Survey Delivers Some Very Bad News for Gun-Control Advocates

Eighty-eight million American adults. Roughly 461 million firearms. About 40 million AR-15-type rifles. A new national survey by Georgetown University professor William English put those numbers on the board last week.

The numbers alone are interesting. How English got them this time around is probably more important.

English's 2021 survey ended up all over Second Amendment litigation. By December 2024, it had been cited in roughly 65 briefs and came up during Supreme Court arguments in New York State Rifle & Pistol Association v. Bruen. Five academics later published a critique in the SMU Law Review.

Because of serious methodological issues, English’s draft fails to provide a reliable estimate of the number of annual defensive gun uses, the stock of AR-15s, or the actual protective value of or frequency with which AR-15 type firearms have been used. The paper should not be used as an authoritative source.

Among their complaints: English asked whether people had ever owned an AR-15 or similarly styled rifle. His ownership questions also left open whether respondents were counting their own guns or somebody else's in the household.

So the 2026 survey asks different questions.

English surveyed 51,398 adults and counted 16,688 as validated gun owners. Respondents were told to count firearms they personally owned. AR-15 owners were asked what they own now. Other similarly styled semi-automatic rifles got their own question.

English also required two answers before counting somebody as a gun owner: They had to select firearm ownership in the screening question and later report at least one handgun, rifle, or shotgun.

The result was not a smaller estimate.

Twenty-five percent of gun owners reported owning an AR-15-type rifle, which works out to roughly 22 million adults. When owners of other similarly styled rifles are included — while avoiding double-counting people who own both — English estimates that 26.4 million adults own at least one rifle in those categories.

Then there is the actual gun count: about 40 million AR-15-type rifles and another 20 million similarly styled rifles.

Magazines moved in the same direction. The old survey found 48 percent had ever owned a magazine holding more than 10 rounds. In 2026, 50.5 percent said they currently own one. English estimates 44.5 million people own roughly 539 million of them.

Defensive gun use drew another fight.

Critics objected to English taking incidents reported over a person's lifetime and using them to calculate an annual number. 

This time respondents were asked how old they were when each incident happened. They were also asked whether they were dealing with a person or an animal.

The survey finds that 37.6% of gun owners have used a firearm to defend themselves, their property, a family member, or a member of their household, and it estimates that guns are used defensively by firearms owners in approximately 2.2 million incidents per year.

Most did not involve anybody pulling the trigger. No shot was fired in 76.3 percent of reported incidents. More than one assailant was involved in 50.8 percent.

And these aren't numbers landing in a vacuum. Viramontes v. Cook County and Grant v. Higgins involve restrictions on AR-15s and similar semi-automatic rifles and are before the Supreme Court this fall. 

The new survey has been public for only a few days, and the academics will have their say. But the data is already on the field. The estimated 88 million American gun owners don't need a law review article to know what they own.

Editor’s Note: The radical Left will stop at nothing to enact their extreme gun control agenda and strip us of our Second Amendment rights.

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