Everyone can now carry gun in public without permit as Texas senate passes bill

Once it reaches the desk, Texas governor Greg Abbott said it will sign the bill that will allow Texans to carry gun in public without permit. The bill passed the Texas senate on Wednesday in an 18-13 vote along party lines.

The current law does not require any license to carry rifle or handgun. However, there are some things to be done in order to be allowed to carry a handgun: fingerprints, four hours of training, written exam and shooting proficiency test.

Charles Schwertner, a Republican state senator, said that the bill is “a restoration of the belief in and trust of our citizens”.

“We cannot allow another session to come and go where we pay lip service for the second amendment by failing to fully restore and protect the rights of citizens granted by the constitution.”

A recent poll regarding the bill showed that majority of Texans don’t support the bill. According to the poll results, at least 59% of Texans oppose this policy. 85% od Democrats oppose this bill, while 56% of Republicans support this measure.

The Democratic senator, Beverly Powell, said that current law is by far better compared to the new bill. Powell also expressed her safety concerns regarding the bill and said:

“If I sit down at a restaurant with a gentleman or a woman who has a holster on their side and a gun in it, I want to know that person is well-trained in the use of that gun,” she said.

Texas is one of the states with several mass shootings in the last couple of years. Two of these were recorded in a single month, August 2019. A total of 30 people were killed in these two occasions.

In a high school shooting in May 2018, a total od 10 people were killed. 27 people were also killed in a church shooting that took place in November 2017.

Despite the mass shootings in the country lately, several states including Texas are about to loosen its gun restrictions. South Carolina and Florida are about to allow open carry gun permit too.