New Pew Research Confirms ‘Assault Weapons’ Rarely Used in Crimes

Pew Research has released some interesting and new collated data on gun-involved crimes in the United States in 2024, and their stats confirm what Second Amendment advocates and those opposed to bans on so-called assault weapons have been saying for decades: they are rarely used in crimes of any kind in the United States. 

According to Pew, rifles of all kinds (including so-called assault weapons) were involved in just 3% of gun-related homicides in 2024. Handguns were involved in 53%, with “undetermined” firearms involved in 42% of homicides. 

The Supreme Court rejected the idea that handguns could be banned just because they were the most popular choice of weapon for criminals, but gun control advocates are arguing that a category of commonly-owned firearms that is much less popular among violent criminals can be outlawed. 

Of course, it’s not garden variety criminals who the gun control lobby invoke in their arguments about banning “assault weapons.” They regularly proclaim that AR-15s and other semi-automatic rifles are the weapon of choice for mass shooters. A 2023 report by the Secret Service’s National Threat Assessment Center, however, found that 74% of active shooters between 2016 and 2020 used handguns, while 32% used long guns (some used both, which is why the numbers don’t add up to 100%). Even among the most depraved criminals, handguns are far more common than “assault weapons.” 

Pew also found far fewer active shootings overall in 2024; 24 separate events, which is a decline of almost 66% compared to the 61 recorded in 2021. Incidentally, Pew uses the FBI’s definition of an active shooting:  one or more individuals actively engaged in killing or attempting to kill people in a populated area.

The number of all gun-involved murders was also down substantially in 2024; a trend that appears to have continued throughout 2025 and into 2026. Gun-involved suicides, however, continue to climb. 

• The gun homicide rate fell to 4.7 fatalities per 100,000 people in 2024, far below the peak rate of 7.2 per 100,000 in 1974.
• The gun suicide rate, by contrast, is on par with its all-time high. There were 7.6 gun suicides per 100,000 people in 2024 – about equal to the record 7.7 per 100,000 in 1977.

Over 60% of total gun-involved deaths were suicides in 2024, and a majority of suicides involved a firearm. 

The Second Amendment community and firearm industry partners are not ignoring this issue. They’re tackling it head on through a variety of organizations and means, including groups like Walk the Talk America, apps targeting veterans, and voluntary off-site storage initiatives from Hold My Guns, Safer Together, and others. Many of us have had friends or loved ones take their own life, and whether or not a firearm was involved we take mental health and emotional resilience very seriously. We just don’t believe that the gun control lobby’s plan is constitutional or effective; things like expanding “red flag” laws, instituting waiting periods on gun sales, and establishing voluntary “Do Not Sell To” lists that individuals can place themselves on and be prohibited from purchasing a gun.

According to Pew, the overall gun death rate in the United States in 2024 was 12.8 per 100,000 people, well off the high of 16.3 per 100K in 1974. The gun-related homicide rate of 4.7 was the lowest its been since at least 1967, but the gun-involved suicide rate of 7.6 was the highest in almost 30 years, and on par with the highest rates recorded since the 1960s. 

If the gun control lobby devoted its time and deep pockets to funding efforts like Walk the Talk America and Hold My Guns, it would make a world of difference. Groups like Giffords and Everytown like to tout the success of community based violence intervention programs, and in a sense that’s exactly what these groups are doing; serving a specific community with a goal of reducing violence, in this case, gun owners and self-harm. 

That’ll never happen, though. The end goal of the gun control lobby isn’t just “no more gun deaths.” It’s zero gun deaths because there are zero guns. The gun control lobby lavishes praise on community violence intervention programs, but they’re also still spending big money to lobby for gun bans and measures that make it more expensive and legally risky to keep, bear, buy, and sell firearms. 

We’ve already demonstrated that more guns doesn’t lead to more crime. We need to do the same when it comes to firearms and suicides. We won’t get the gun control lobby’s help, but we can still help support those groups in 2A spaces that are doing life-changing and life-saving work without infringing on a fundamental right. 

Editor’s Note: President Trump and Republicans across the country are doing everything they can to protect our Second Amendment rights and right to self-defense.

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