Recently, former Gov. Jeb Bush spoke at the National Rifle Association's annual convention, and Bush pointed out that Florida was friendly for gun rights, citing that over 1.3 million Floridians have concealed weapons permits.
According to Bush, Florida has the most concealed weapon permits in the nation. "Nearly double that of the second state, which is Texas," he claimed.
PolitiFact Florida looked at the claim and rated it MOSTLY TRUE.
"This was a fairly straight-forward fact check," reporter Joshua Gillin said. "We pulled the records for concealed-carry licenses, and Florida has almost 1.4 million concealed-carry licenses. We then took a look at Texas numbers, and they have issued just over 708,000 permits. That's just shy of the 'nearly double' claim that Bush used in his statement."
The reason that it doesn't rate completely true, Gillin said, is Bush forgot about another state that issues concealed-carry gun permits. "Believe it or not, Pennsylvania has issued just over 1 million permits," Gillin said. "That puts Pennsylvania firmly in second place in the U.S. Texas ranks third on the list."
Gillin notes that Bush's error with the list of states only reduces his rating by one position, because Florida definitely is the leader when it comes to concealed-carry gun permits, and we have almost twice as many as Texas. The absence of Pennsylvania in Bush's claim leads to a MOSTLY TRUE rating by PolitiFact.
SOURCES: Florida number one in concealed-carry gun permits?
- PolitiFact ruling
- National Rifle Association, Gov. Jeb Bush speech, April 10, 2015
- Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services, Concealed weapon permit holders by county and number of licenses by type, March 31, 2015
- U.S. Government Accountability Office, concealed weapons permit data by state, July 2012
- Texas Department of Public Safety, Active license/certified instructor counts, Dec. 31, 2014
- Georgia Probate Court, Civil Caseload, 2013
- PolitiFact Florida, "Florida is No. 1 in concealed permits, Rick Scott says," Aug. 14, 2012
- PolitiFact Florida, "Are alligator attacks more common than ‘attacks’ by those with a gun permit in Florida?" March 23, 2015
- PolitiFact Florida, "Self-defense deaths in Florida have increased dramatically since ‘stand your ground’ became law in 2005, lawmaker claims," March 26, 2012
- PolitiFact Georgia, "Deal on target with gun permit estimate," May 6, 2014
- Interview, Matt Gorman, Jeb Bush’s Right to Rise PAC, April 13, 2015
- Interview, Pennsylvania State Trooper and spokesman Adam Reed, April 14, 2015
- Interview, John R. Lott, Crime Prevention Research Center president, April 14, 2015
- Interview, Marion Hammer, Unified Sportsmen of Florida president, April 10, 2015
- Interview, Summer Blackwell, Texas Department of Public Safety spokeswoman, April 13, 2015
- Interview, Avery Palmer, Violence Policy Center spokeswoman, April 13, 2015
- Interview, Cynthia H. Clanton, General Counsel Judicial Council/Administrative Office of the Courts in Georgia, April 14, 2015
- Interview, Jerry Henry, Georgiacarry.org, April 14, 2015
- Interview, Erin Gillespie, Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services spokeswoman, April 14, 2015