Just a quick point of correction, not to derail the conversation, but "automatic" weapons have been heavily restricted since 1934. Buying one requires a tax st

Just a quick point of correction, not to derail the conversation, but "automatic" weapons have been heavily restricted since 1934. Buying one requires a tax stamp, background check (even if private sale), notifying the ATF of where the weapon is at all times, and giving the ATF the right to search the premises of the firearms at any time without need for a warrant or reasonable suspicion. As far as I can find data for, legally-licensed automatic weapons have only been used in 2 homicides since 1934 (both by police officers, weirdly) and a single suicide. To address your data directly, it has some issues. The first is that there was no "large increase in gun deaths". The lowest gun deaths during the 1994-2004 period was 5.9/100k, and the highest it's been since 2004 is 6.2/100k. About a 5% increase. 2001 was actually the highest since 1994, at 7.1/100k. That's per CDC data. The incidence of mass shootings is what they're talking about, not gun violence overall. The second is that we're working with small numbers here. Homicides with a rifle are exceedingly uncommon; per FBI data, it's about 300/year. Your link is specifically discussing mass shootings, which are rarer yet. For the 3 periods, they list 19 events, 12 events, and 34 events, each spread across a decade. Columbine happened in the middle of that period. The third is that the correlation isn't as tight as you might presume. Have a gander at https://www.statista.com/statistics/811487/number-of-mass-shootings-in-the-us/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/811487/number-of-mass-sh... Unless someone pointed it out, it would be hard to guess where the assault weapons ban even is in time. The numbers aren't really notably different until 2001. Mass shootings aren't even noticeably high until 2007 when we hit the recession, which is a massive confounding factor. The fourth is that if assault weapons are to blame, you would expect numbers to roughly match before and after. They don't. 2005-2006 follow roughly the same trend as before. It's not until 2007 when they go up (again, recession), and 2012 before it gets really crazy. 2012 is coincidentally when US median wealth hit it's lowest after the recession, and hasn't really recovered since then. California has more mass shootings per year now than they did before 2016 when they passed their high capacity magazine ban. I don't think it's causal, just of note. There are just so many other factors that play into this. Increased media attention on mass shootings, niche online communities forming, increased political polarization, increased wealth inequality, zero tolerance school policies, etc. I also find it a bad thing to focus on. Every death is a tragedy, but rifles are low on the chart of causes. Homicides by rifles are roughly equal to deaths by ladder. About 2 times as many people are beat to death with hands/feet. About 5 times as many people are stabbed to death. About 10 times as many people die from foodborne illness. About 20 times as many people die of anemia. It just doesn't make sense. Even if you want to focus on guns, why rifles? Handguns are used to kill roughly 50 times as many people.