Voter Intimidation: Some States Working To Ban Guns At Voting Sites

By Michael Waldman\Brennan Center Photos: YouTube Screenshots Only 12 states and Washington, DC, prohibit both open and concealed carry of firearms at poll sites. It’s among the most unnerving statistics I’ve ever read in a Brennan Center report. There’s simply no reason for guns to be at polling places. Failing to ban them at places where people vote seems like a dereliction of duty by state legislatures. And in many states, it really is as simple as that. But several states had previously implemented broad restrictions on gun possession, including at polling places, before the legal landscape for regulating firearms shifted following the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Bruen in 2022, by far the most extreme Second Amendment ruling ever. While Bruen compelled those states whose laws it throttled to restart the messy process of passing gun control legislation — often in the face of stiff opposition from a vocal minority of gun enthusiasts — the Court emphasized that restrictions on firearms in sensitive places like poll sites are constitutionally permissible. The good news is that some states are making progress in keeping guns away from election sites. In November, the Michigan House of Representatives passed two bills to ban...