Poll: PA voters support assault weapons, high cap magazine ban, same-sex marriage
Pennsylvania voters support stricter gun-control laws, including a national ban on sales of assault weapons and high capacity magazines, as well as universal background checks. Voters said they approved (60-37 percent) of a national ban on the sale of assault weapons and supported (59-39 percent) a ban on high capacity magazines in a Quinnipiac University poll taken one month after the massacre of 20 children and six adults at a school in Newtown, Conn.
Poll: PA voters support assault weapons, high cap magazine ban, same-sex marriage
Pennsylvania voters support stricter gun-control laws, including a national ban on sales of assault weapons and high capacity magazines, as well as universal background checks, a new poll found.
Voters said they approved (60-37 percent) of a national ban on the sale of assault weapons and supported (59-39 percent) a ban on high capacity magazines, according to a Quinnipiac University poll taken one month after the massacre of 20 children and six adults at a school in Newtown, Conn.
By an overwhelming (95-5 percent) margin, voters supported requiring background checks for all gun buyers.
Fifty-seven percent of Pennsylvania voters agreed that gun-control laws should be stricter, while 4 percent say less strict and 35 percent say keep state laws as they are. National gun-control laws should be stricter, 60 percent of statewide voters said.
“Keystone State voters, especially voters in urban areas, seem to have had enough of gun violence," said Tim Malloy, assistant director of Quinnipiac University Polling Institute. "By large margins, voters don’t think assault weapons belong in the hands of any gun owner. Restrict the firepower of assault weapons or ban them entirely Pennsylvanians say."
Pennsylvania voters were divided on same-sex marriage, with 47 percent in favor and 43 percent opposed. Support was much higher among voters 18 to 34 years old (68-25 percent) compared with voters 35 to 54 who approved it by a 48 -41 percent margin. Voters over 55 were opposed to gay marriage 53 - 39 percent.
Support for gay marriage was higher (50 – 40 percent among women) while men disapproved 46-44 percent.
Most voters (37 percent) cited the economy as the most important problem facing the state when asked an open-ended question on the top issue. Another 10 percent list education and only 8 percent list taxes, followed by 7 percent each for the state budget and for politicians.
Pennsylvania voters were divided on Gov. Corbett's expected proposal to raise the tax on gas stations to pay for road and bridge repair, with 45 percent supporting and 47 percent opposing the $2 billion tax.
A total of 82 percent of voters said they were “very concerned” or “somewhat concerned” that the cost of the new tax would be passed on to them, while 18 percent are “not too concerned” or “not concerned at all.”
The poll surveyed 1,221 registered voters between January 22 – 27 and has a margin of error of plus or minus 2.8 percentage points. Live interviewers called both land lines and cell phones.
Click herefor Philly.com's politics page.
How come I never get called for any of these polls?— wokmaster- Have patience. The day someone needs a couple thousand fools for an opinion poll about some nonsense issue, they will call you. Meanwhile, don't expect to be asked about relevant matters. It's not your field of expertise.
— DonQ - This Poll shows knee jerk reactions, nothing more.
It does not show intelligent people actually trying to solve a problem.
So it is often with public policy, knee jerk attempts to solve a problem that make most problems worse and that always punish the honest people.
Remember the aberration of the doctor in West Philadelphia who ran a dirty shoddy abortion practice? So after he was discovered and shut down all the knee jerky people came out and proposed policies to punish everyone else who had been running honest, clean, needed and ethical practices. Everyone else was required to pay more for a slew of new regulations to run their already honest, ethical, needed and much needed practices. Crazy!
So too with guns; the knee jerky people are proposing all the same things that have not worked before, and that will just punish all the law abiding people and ignore the things that will solve most of the problem; no one can ever solve all the problems all the time.
Politicians can never solve any problem any time but we are all knee jerky ourselves for thinking that these mostly very stupid people, politicians, can do much of anything.— GAC - If you want to duplicate those results, all you need to do is call 1,221 registered voters from the Bloomberg supporters database. Manipulating the sample is the oldest trick in "voodoo" statistics.— DonQ
- Interesting conspiracy...that explains it!! — wokmaster
- No conspiracy. There's no law against manipulating the sample in an opinion poll. In fact, it's commonplace. — DonQ
- Quinnipiac is a fairly reliable pollster. They performed well in the 2012 presidential election.
Do you remember that election? The one where all the polls oversampled Obama voters, LOL.— carl and sons - Fortunately, we do not live in a democracy, we live with a Constitutionally limited Republic, where the whims of the uneducated mob are limited. For example; in PA, any purchase of a handgun (private or from a dealer) requires a State Police background check, and all purchases from a dealer (including the dealers that are at Gun Shows, which is a large majority of who is there) require a background check.
The only 'unchecked' purchases are Bob selling his hunting rifle to his neighbor.— DeltaV - "in PA, any purchase of a handgun (private or from a dealer) requires a State Police background check" -
you are pretty clueless - or you have never been to a PA Gun show - where the parking lots are full of trucks and vans selling guns with ZERO paperwork - just lots of CASH. -- and many of those trucks and vans selling - have VA state license plates.— pal - and wasn't that Corbett's job as PA AG -- name me ONE illegal purchase arrest and trial from Corbett's AG from 1995 - 1997 or during the years 2005 - 2011.
Corbett directed the PA State Police -- did they arrest anyone at a gun show for an illegal gun purchase?
oh wait - Corbett had them investigate Dem PA politicians instead.
in fact - Corbett had so many so busy while investigating the Dem politicians -- he had Only ONE investigate the crimes of Jerry Sandusky abusing children.— pal - Pal:
If so, they should be prosecuted. But that is already illegal; they don't need another law to say the same thing.
Additionally, it is already federal law that sales between residents of different states requires transfer through a FFL and a background check. If that law is being circumvented, prosecute them.— DeltaV - Can see it now! ATF and State Police show up at Gun Show to arrest anyone not doing background checks.
The wing nuts scream THERE COMING FOR ARE GUNS!!
Damn if you do damn if you don't!— gibby58 - Why is the Govt trying to keep weapons out of OUR hands while at the same time they give weapons to Mexicans, Egypt, Iran, Syria, etc, etc.??? Does the word CONTROL come to mind to anyone???— keapitreal
- It's not the government. The government has no will of its own. It's the conniving individuals who would use the government against the people in order to achieve their selfish ends. — DonQ
- All those conniving individuals who responded to the poll conducted nationally on November 6th?
Who'da thought? - here is my vote I"M NOT FOR IT— RichH
- Yeah, but are they going to rename that mountain that's offending those two women?— He Visto Todo
- Perfect! From now on send the FBI,ATF or State Police to all guns shows to enforce any law pertaining to gun sales. Then the criminals will stop going and they can harass the good gun owners. Anyway you do it someone will yell my rights are infringed.— gibby58
- the overt bias of this site is remarkable. pretty much a democratic liberal organ.— jstash
- You can poll all you want but the party in state power has made a mockery of the people's will. Where else could you get 13 of 18 congressional seats with less than 50% of the vote. Looking at any voting district map in PA will make your head spin.— meteo30
