A report from the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF) shows that states with stricter control lead other states in adolescent firearm deaths.
NSSF based their findings on a June 2025 study published in the Journal for American Medical Association Pediatrics (JAMA Pediatrics).
The title of the study is, “Firearm Laws and Pediatric Mortality in the US,” and its authors categorized states into three groups, “Strict,” “Permissive” and “Most Permissive.” The authors then claimed, “…permissive firearm laws contributed to thousands of excess firearm deaths among children living in states with permissive policies; future work should focus on determining which types of laws conferred the most harm and which offered the most protection.”
Establishment media outlets like the New York Times, ABC News, and CNN ran with the authors’ claim, leaving NSSF to note that the outlets never asked why the “study’s authors manipulate the data by using estimated, predicted and crude-rate adjusted figures instead of analyzing the real incidents.” NSSF responded by noting that a simple look at raw Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data tells a completely different story.
According to the NSSF:
Rebuilding the data set using the same time, population and mechanism parameters established by the authors using CDC’s data tells a different story entirely. The eight states the authors rated as “Strict” and having the most restrictive gun control laws – California, New York, Maryland, Rhode Island, Illinois, Connecticut, Massachusetts and New Jersey – on average saw more unadjusted adolescent firearm mortality than the 11 “Permissive” and 30 “Most Permissive” states.
“The firearm industry isn’t deterred or distracted by biased studies that push political narratives,” NSSF added. “For decades, the firearm industry has brought forward effective and proven firearm safety initiatives to keep firearms beyond the reach of those who should never have them. That includes unsupervised children.”
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, a member of Gun Owners of America, and the director of global marketing for Lone Star Hunts. He was a Visiting Fellow at the Russell Kirk Center for Cultural Renewal in 2010 and has a Ph.D. in Military History. Follow him on Instagram: @awr_hawkins. You can sign up to get Down Range at breitbart.com/downrange. Reach him directly at
