Florida About to Be the First State with a Million Concealed Carry Gun Permits
In the wake of the gun control debate raging after the Aurora shooting last week, we hear that Florida will soon have one million people in possession of concealed weapons. According to The South Florida Sun-Sentinel by way of The Awl, this will make the state — which is issuing between 10,000 and 12,000 "carry permits" a month — the first to reach this somewhat dubious "milestone." The state's agriculture commissioner told the paper that at the rate the state is going, it will get to a million by the next six weeks or two months.
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So who is walking around with a concealed weapon in Florida? Well, 80 percent are men, mostly middle-aged*:
Of Florida's 952,000 total permit holders, the majority, 243,505, are between the ages of 51 and 65. About 11 percent of all permit holders are from out of state.
The Sun-Sentinel reports that the number of permits being obtained began to rise with the election of President Obama. The spokesman for the department that handles carry permits said there is "always seems to be a concern when there's a change in federal administration, when there might be some attention placed on gun control laws."
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Let us not forget that Florida is staging ground of the highly publicized Trayvon Martin case, wherein the teenaged Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman, who had one such permit.
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Correction: The original version of this story incorrectly said that 80 of Florida's concealed gun permits were held by middle-aged men.
