Poll: More Americans want stricter gun laws

By Kelly Cohen, Kelly Cohen

Published December 20, 2015

A majority of Americans want stricter gun laws.

Nearly six in 10 (55 percent) of American adults want stricter regulations on gun sales, according to a new Gallup crime survey. That's up 8 percentage from 2014. Just 33 percent say laws should remain the same, while 11 percent want fewer laws.

Despite the high mark, it is still below the 58 percent in 2013 who wanted more gun sale laws following the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting. This more recent survey was done just days after the shooting at Umpqua Community College in Oregon that left 10 dead.

In 2014, 30 percent of gun owners wanted stricter laws, but that increased to 36 percent. Among non-gun owners, 57 percent wanted tougher laws in 2014, and that also rose, to 64 percent.