Authorities discovered 23 guns in the Las Vegas hotel room of Stephen Paddock, the man who opened fire on a crowd of country-music fans on October 1. At least 12 of those guns were weapons equipped with bump stocks, devices used to increase a gun's rate of fire. In the days following the massacre, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle suggested Congress should review rules regulating bump stocks. The National Rifle Association, which is typically quiet after mass shootings, broke its silence to say the same.
But as policymakers and influence groups were debating legislation, another more fundamental debate began among those who have spent their careers studying gun violence: Are mass shootings a problem with a meaningful legislative solution?
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