The shooting at a Poway, California, synagogue Saturday has touched off a tragic but inevitable series of reactions, including confusion, horror, grief and resolve within a mourning community.
And then comes a discussion about how to prevent anything like this from happening again.
In the wake of past mass shootings, that’s typically included calls for even tighter gun control in a state that already has among the strictest gun laws in the nation.
This time, that response has been more muted.
Beto O’Rourke, the presidential candidate from Texas, told a crowd in Los Angeles, hours after the Poway attack, that he would push for universal background checks “without loopholes or exceptions,” according to The Los Angeles Times.
But Gov. Gavin Newsom — who, as governor-elect, called the National Rifle Association “bankrupt, morally” just after the Thousand Oaks shooting in November — instead announced $15 million in funding aimed at boosting security for religious organizations.
His office didn’t respond to a request for comment on whether he thought the state should consider more gun restrictions going forward.
I asked Mark Baldassare, president and survey director for the nonpartisan Public Policy Institute of California, about whether historically strong support for gun restrictions might wane if they are seen as ineffective in preventing high-profile incidents — even if, as The New York Times reported last year, California has been successful in cutting overall gun deaths by half over the past 25 years.
Probably not, he said.
“There’s no question in my mind that people watch these events, and there’s a cumulative effect among most Californians that we need stricter gun controls,” he said.
Baldassare said the organization had asked whether Californians would support stricter gun laws four times since 2015, and each time, somewhere between 60% and 73% have said they would.
He said that 73 percent reading came in the aftermath of the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida.
As for whether an increased focus on security at places that might become targets might inspire a shift in Californians’ thinking about the use of firearms, Baldassare said it remained to be seen.
However, he said, a possible parallel could be found in Californians’ attitudes about arming teachers.
In a survey released last month, 70% of adults and 80% of public school parents said they were very or somewhat concerned about the threat of a mass shooting at their local schools.
But 67% of those surveyed opposed allowing more teachers and school officials to carry guns.
Ultimately, Baldassare said among Californians, there’s a sense that “whatever we’ve done is not enough.”
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.