Arizona Lawmakers Criticize Report Calling for Removal of Firearms From Homes With Children

A firearm confiscated by police officers in Westminster, Calif., on May 10, 2022. John Fredricks/The Epoch Times

An Arizona state legislative report on child deaths that advocates for the removal of all firearms from homes with children has drawn criticism from two lawmakers for violating the Second Amendment.

Republican Reps. Quang Nguyen and Selina Bliss expressed disapproval of the 2023 annual report to the Legislature from the Arizona Child Fatality Review Team in a letter to Jennie Cunico, the cabinet executive officer of the Arizona Department of Health Services.

According to the report, 853 children died in Arizona in 2023, and local CFRP review teams determined that 49 percent of these deaths “were preventable.”

The report cited that the leading causes or manners of preventable deaths in 2023 were motor vehicle crashes, firearm injuries, suffocation, fentanyl poisoning, and drowning.

“Sixty-eight children died due to a firearm injury in 2023, and we have seen a staggering 171 percent increase in child deaths to firearms in the past decade,” the report noted.

The report said that all of the 68 firearm deaths in 2023 were determined to be preventable.

“Since the CFRP determined that access to guns was the most significant risk factor for firearm deaths, CFRP believes that the most effective way to prevent firearm-related deaths in children is to remove all firearms in households with children because the presence of firearms in a household increases the risk of suicide among adolescents.

“Parents of all adolescents should remove all guns from their homes, especially if there is a history of mental health issues or substance use issues.

“In addition, CFRP recommends that all gun owners should practice safe storage of their firearms by keeping guns unloaded and locked in a safe separate from the ammunition.”

In their letter to ADHS, Nguyen and Bliss said CFRT’s report was a “radical attack“ on Arizonans’ constitutional rights, drawing parallels with state efforts to curtail Second Amendment rights.

Both representatives said the proposal is reminiscent of New Mexico’s Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham’s 2023 gun control order, which attempted to prohibit the carrying of firearms in public for self-defense. 

A judge blocked the proposal as unconstitutional.

“We are appalled that the CFRT, speaking on behalf of the Arizona Department of Health Services, is actually advocating for stripping Arizonans of their Second Amendment rights in their own homes,” the lawmakers wrote.

As chairman of Arizona’s House Judiciary Committee, Nguyen said that “proposals to strip citizens of their firearms are not only unconstitutional but also lack common sense.

“While the report suggests reasonable safety measures for other risks, such as drowning, the CFRT overreaches by advocating for the elimination of firearms entirely from homes with children.”

Both lawmakers said that effective policy solutions to problems that are hard and complicated should protect constitutional rights and liberties and not work to undermine them.

The Pew Research Center reports that between 2019 and 2021, the number of gun deaths among children and teenagers in the United States increased by 50 percent.

In 2019, before the coronavirus pandemic, there were 1,732 gun deaths involving minors under the age of 18. According to the report, that number had risen to 2,590 by 2021.

These children died in a variety of ways, such as suicides, gun-related accidents, and homicides, the report said.

According to the RAND Gun Policy in America initiative, 35 states and the District of Columbia had Child-Access Prevention (CAP) laws in effect as of Jan. 1, 2024. 

Regardless of whether a child has access to or uses a gun, the strictest laws punish criminally for negligent storage.