Biden on Assault weapons
When we passed the assault weapons ban, mass shootings went down. When the law expired, mass shootings tripled. — Joe Biden, Tuesday, May 24, 2022.
There was no drop in the number of attacks with assault weapons during the 1994 to 2004 ban. There was an increase after the ban sunset, but the change is not statistically significant. More importantly, if Biden’s claim is correct, we should see a drop in the percent of attacks with assault weapons during the federal ban period and then an increase in the post-ban period, but the exact opposite is true. You can’t have the ban reducing the number of attacks without the share of attacks using assault weapons falling.
The number of attacks surely has not tripled after the ban ended.
The data used in these graphs is available here and here.
