May 20, 2026 • 17 mins
What actually drives change on an issue like gun violence? Is it policy? Culture? Policing? Or something harder to measure?
To help answer that question I’m turning to Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut. Senator Murphy has been one of Washington’s leading voices on gun violence reduction, a passion that was shaped by his experience in the aftermath of Sandy Hook, where he spent time with families and saw firsthand the impact of that tragedy .
In this episode, we talk about the recent decline in gun violence nationally, what role federal legislation and local interventions may have played, and how the broader movement around this issue has evolved over time.
Chris Murphy, the junior United States senator for Connecticut, has dedicated his career to public service as an advocate for Connecticut families. Murphy has been a leading voice in the Senate, fighting for affordable health care, sensible gun laws, a forward-looking foreign policy, and a democracy and economy that serves working people. In 2022, he led the negotiations and helped pass the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, the first federal anti-gun violence bill in 30 years.
Prior to his election to the US Senate, Murphy served Connecticut’s Fifth Congressional District for three terms in the US House of Representatives. During his time in the House, he worked to foster job creation, advocate for affordable health care for all Americans, and improve homeless veterans’ access to housing. Before being elected to Congress, Murphy served for eight years in the Connecticut General Assembly.
Senator Murphy grew up in Wethersfield, Connecticut, and attended Williams College in Massachusetts before earning a law degree from the University of
Connecticut.
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SPEAKER_00 (00:00):
I'm Jeff Asher, and this is the Jeffalytics Podcast.
(00:03):
What actually drives change onan issue like gun violence?
Is it policy, culture, policing,or something harder to measure?
To help answer that question,I'm turning to Senator Chris
Murphy of Connecticut.
Senator Murphy has been one ofWashington's leading voices on
gun violence reduction, apassion that was shaped by his
experience in the aftermath ofSandy Hook, where he spent time
with families and saw firsthandthe impact of that tragedy.
(00:24):
In this episode, we talk aboutthe recent decline in gun
violence nationally, what rolefederal legislation and local
interventions may have played,and how the broader movement
around this issue has evolvedover time.
We also get into the challengesof communicating progress, why
fear can persist even when thedata improves, and how politics
and culture shape what peopleare willing to believe.
The numbers are moving in theright direction, but gun
(00:45):
violence is by no means solved.
This conversation with SenatorMurphy is about where the future
of gun violence reduction policyis heading.
Let's dive in.
My guest today is Senator ChrisMurphy from the lovely state of
Connecticut.
Senator Murphy, thank you somuch for joining me.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Launching right in, um, what isyour background?
I'm really curious.
How did you obviously get intothe Senate?
(01:07):
Um, how does one do that?
And what motivates youspecifically to focus so heavily
on this work?
SPEAKER_01 (01:13):
Yeah, I I I guess everybody has a different path.
Um, you know, I've kind of beenan organizer my entire life.
I think I was an organizer bybirth in some ways.
When I was a teenager, I was,you know, organizing student
protests against an unjust highschool dress code.
I was the one who organized allthe touch football games in my
neighborhood as an elementaryschool and middle school
(01:34):
student.
You know, I had a passion as akid for environmental politics,
and I discovered that there wasthis thing you could do with
your pastime or your life,politics, where you organized
people for good.
And I became involved andaddicted to it at an early age.
So I was, you know, elected tolocal office when I was 24,
(01:56):
state office when I was 25, um,was the youngest senator when I
got here uh two terms ago.
And, you know, I still thinkthis is an honorable profession.
Uh, I've been doing it longenough that I've been able to
make some really positivechange.
The reason that I care so deeplyabout the issue of gun violence,
though, is, you know, because ofsomething that happened in my
(02:17):
state.
Um, I had not worked on theissue of gun violence when I was
in the state legislature, in thehouse.
You know, it was an issue Icared about, but was not a
priority issue for me.
And then um the Sandy Hookmassacre happened in between uh
when I was elected to the Senateand when I was sworn in.
And I was about the same age asall those parents.
I had kids who are just a littlebit younger than the kids who
were killed in Sandy Hook.
(02:38):
And uh, you know, either a lotof days that I wish I hadn't
been there.
Uh, you know, I was in thefirehouse as the parents were
being told what had happened inthe school.
Um, I spent a lot of time withthose parents.
I went to a lot of funerals andwakes in the following days and
weeks.
And and and, you know, I was aninterloper to their grief.
I don't want to overstate thethe way it changed my life, but
(02:59):
it did change my politicalcareer.
I mean, I that became the issuethat I woke up every day, uh,
the issue uh that dominated andhas dominated my career.
It's it's because of thatexperience in Connecticut.
SPEAKER_00 (03:10):
So I ask a lot of people this question, but I
think very few of them, probablynobody have asked to this point,
have your unique perspective onthis.
But you look at everythingthat's happened nationally,
enormous surge in murder in2020, and now we're seeing this
enormous historic decline.
To what do you attribute all ofthat that we're seeing in terms
of the falling murder,incredible fall in gun violence
(03:32):
over the last few years?
SPEAKER_01 (03:33):
Yeah, I I mean, I guess I don't have a better read
on it than anyone else.
Obviously, you know, it peakedduring the pandemic when people
were more desperate than everbefore, and it makes sense that
there was going to be a decline.
Sometimes, you know, there arejust sort of natural peak points
(03:54):
where you you sort of reach themaximum point of saturation.
But I don't think that it isunconnected at all to the state
and federal mobilization aroundthis issue.
I think the federal law wepassed in 2022 made a
difference.
(04:15):
Uh, I think the billions ofdollars we ended up spending in
anti-gun violence initiativesmade a difference.
But I think the movement itselfbecame so powerful over those 10
years, became so mainstream overthose 10 years that it did
fundamentally change the waythat people view this issue.
(04:36):
And I think the way in whichindividuals who may have been
contemplating gun violence as ameans to project power or to
deal with inner demons thoughtabout the decision to pick up a
gun.
Um, I don't think it's acoincidence that all of the
major decreases in gun violenceover the past 100 years come
(04:58):
after major federal debates overgun violence, whether it's the
two big bills passed in the 30sor the bills passed in 93 and
94.
I think when the federalgovernment sort of steps in and
signals, not just in a statutoryway, but in a moral way, that
we've had enough, I think thatends up having a cultural impact
(05:20):
as much as it does have a legalimpact.
SPEAKER_00 (05:24):
And sort of looking forward the next decade, the
next 15 years, what is thefuture of gun violence
reduction, the future of the gunviolence movement look like, gun
violence reduction movement?
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Yeah.
And one of the things that Ithink accounts for the
reductions is that um we gotgood during the period between
Sandy Hook and the shooting inUvaldi at recognizing
individuals who are in crisis orrecognizing a cycle of violence
before it played out andinterrupting uh the uh gun
(06:01):
violence before it happened.
Um, schools got a lot betterabout being able to monitor kids
that were in crisis.
We put a lot of programming outinto the schools to help them do
that in the cities.
We ended up figuring out how towrap services around a handful
of at-risk kids.
We figured out how to get to theemergency room when there was
(06:22):
one shooting to try to preventthe retributive shooting from
happening.
Uh, I think that's probably beenthe most important work.
And so as I look at the next 10years, I want to continue to
build a bipartisan coalitionaround supporting that work and
those interventions.
I think that's the easiest thingto do because it's not as
politically hot as changes ingun laws are.
(06:45):
But then, of course, I want toget the two big things done that
I think would make the biggestdifference, which is universal
national background checks and aban on assault weapons.
And I do think that we can getboth of those things done in the
next five to 10 years federally.
Um so, you know, to me, thoseare the two big projects.
SPEAKER_00 (07:03):
Is there a way forward on criminal justice?
Um, you've probably heard this,but Washington is pretty
divided.
This has been an issue where,especially on the reform side,
there's been a bipartisanconsensus, at least in the last
10 years.
Is there a way to build abipartisan consensus on gun
violence reduction that sort oftakes into account the gun
(07:26):
control versus gun rights debateand comes to sensible policy
solutions?
SPEAKER_01 (07:31):
Well, I certainly think there is.
Um, and you know, the evidenceis in the bill we passed in
2022, uh, that was a bill thatwas, you know, obviously not
everything I wanted, but it wasfive major changes in gun laws.
And we got 15 Republicans in theSenate, which is not a small
number to support it, with NRAopposition.
(07:53):
All the Second Amendment groupsopposed that bill loudly.
Uh, and we still got 15Republicans to support it.
And and some of them did thatbecause they, you know, actually
had a moral reckoning withthemselves and with the issue.
But others voted for it becausethey just feared that if they
voted against it, they would paya bigger political price back
(08:13):
home than if they uh voted forit.
So I think as we continue togrow the strength of the
anti-gun violence movementpolitically, we'll have a chance
to build on the 2022 bill.
I do think it, you know, ittakes a Democratic Congress.
So we will ha we passed thatbill in 2022 because we had
Democrats in charge of the Houseand the Senate, and a Democratic
president.
(08:34):
So it's still likely that theonly way you can make progress
on this issue is to haveDemocrats in charge of the
Congress and the presidency.
Um, but I think that that's youknow likely going to be where we
sit after Trump is done.
And I think we'll have anotherchance to make some progress.
SPEAKER_00 (08:50):
One of the major issues, and and really is it's
sort of at the center of thispodcast, is the fact that people
don't tend to believe good news.
They don't, they don't have agood perception of what's
happening in terms of crime andgun violence reduction and
things like that.
It have you thought about arethere ways to better communicate
that from sort of this highperch that you sit on that can
(09:11):
help people understand that yetthe issue's not done.
We're not, we haven't solvedthese problems, but they are
improving and these things areworking.
How do you go about doing that?
SPEAKER_01 (09:19):
Yeah, what a what an important question, but a really
big question.
And I'm you know deeplygrateful, Jeff, for the work
that you have done to tell thisstory of what has happened since
2022.
I mean, I still go into very,you know, highly politic
politically educated audienceswho are surprised to learn at
the massive declines that wehave seen in gun violence since
(09:41):
2022 and across the board,right?
You know, mass shootings,homicides, um, school shootings.
Uh so part of it is that we justhave to repeat it.
Uh, we are just not good attelling good news.
Um so I'd love it if all of mycolleagues that supported that
bill um told that story.
Um, but uh and and I'll try tosay very little about this, but
(10:04):
just to tease the topic.
Um, you know, the reason thatpeople don't know that all this
progress has happened is thatthe other side is trying to
constantly make people scared,scared of their neighbors,
scared of immigrants, um, scaredof people with different skin
color than them.
And they use crime as themechanism to do that.
(10:25):
It's a it's a tactic that works.
And so, you know, all they haveto do is talk about, you know,
one particular gruesome crime,and people assume that that's
what's happening everywhere.
Because we live in a countrywhere scare tactics work,
because we live in a countrywhere people are deeply anxious.
(10:46):
Um, it's a it's a it's aneconomy and a culture of
scarcity today, where peoplefeel like they have no hope, no
upward economic mobility, theyhave a harder time finding
meaning and purpose andconnection in their lives,
because we've structured aneconomy and a culture that is
really cold and consolidatespower in the handful of a few
number of people, and you canwork full-time and still not get
(11:08):
ahead, which makes you even moreanxious and makes you looking
over your shoulder to try tounderstand who's to blame for
the situation you're in.
So I think we've got to build acommon good economy.
I think we've got to build aculture in which we care about
each other and we have moreopportunities for a meaningful
connection with each other.
We still have to build ahealthier economy and a
healthier culture where peoplejust wake up every day a little
(11:30):
bit happier than they are today.
And if we do that, then thepolitics of demagoguery and
scare tactics won't work aswell.
And and if and if that's a atactic that doesn't work as well
for the right, then people willbe more willing to believe the
the actual data, the actualtruth that they are very, very
(11:50):
unlikely to be the subjects ofuh incident of gun violence,
less likely today than you know,ever before in the last decade.
But I think that's a toughmessage right now where
everybody feels so on edge andis willing to believe the worst
about um the intent of theirneighbors.
SPEAKER_00 (12:06):
Aaron Powell And sort of looking at it from the
totally opposite side, at somepoint this historic decline will
stop.
Hopefully it doesn't, we don'tsee an increase.
But at some point, somewhere,crime will will go up from this
low level.
Is there a responsible way tocapture the dynamic?
We see this a lot, especially in2020, it felt like from the
(12:26):
left, there was a lot of yes,murder's rising, but it's low,
or sort of minimizing that thisis a big problem that people
sometimes are rightfully scaredof crime while not automatically
going to the, you know, we theonly solution is tough on crime.
We have to be tough on thisproblem.
We need to incarcerate our wayout of this.
Uh is there a middle ground toacknowledge this problem while
(12:48):
not immediately trying to go tothe right as far as possible on
the toughness of this issue?
SPEAKER_01 (12:54):
Well, I mean, query why um Democrats, the left, have
made crime and gun violence twoseparate issues.
Um why don't why aren't they thesame issue?
When when we talk about crime,why aren't we talking about gun
violence and the responses togun violence?
(13:17):
Because that's the the crimethat people are most fearful of.
When people really talk aboutcrime, they are broadly talking
about violent crime.
And when you're talking aboutviolent crime, you're really
talking about a lot of gunviolence.
So I think it's strange that ourparty, you know, talks about gun
violence as one issue and crimeas another issue, which forces
(13:38):
us sometimes to find thesolutions for high crime in a
basket of policy ideas thatdoesn't include changes in our
gun laws, because changes in ourgun laws are in the gun violence
basket.
So if we want to get serious oncrime, we have to get guns out
of the hands of dangerouspeople.
(13:58):
And if a Republican says theycare about crime, but doesn't
want to change the gun laws,then they don't care about
crime.
And we've got to label peoplewho say they care about crime,
but want to make it easy for badpeople to get guns as
illegitimate and insincere.
SPEAKER_00 (14:17):
Last question, last general direction I kind of want
to talk about, because this isan issue that's been on my mind
a lot, is there a role for AI toplay in this debate or in the
gun violence reduction, criminaljustice reform process and to
actually play a role, but to doit responsibly and take
advantage of technology whilealso acknowledging sort of the
(14:38):
limitations of the technology?
SPEAKER_01 (14:39):
I don't know.
I mean, I think there's going tobe a lot of downsides uh to how
AI could be deployed in thisfight.
I'm sure there are upsides.
Obviously, you know, there'sbeen a lot of good efforts to
try to map gun violence, um, totry to understand the places
where you need to deployresources as we're trying to
figure out which interventionswith at-risk young people works.
(15:02):
AI can probably help us get gooddata.
But AI could also facilitatedangerous profiling of
individuals who really aren't athreat, but AI may deem a
threat.
AI has biases that are inherentin it.
Uh, and I don't want to stepinto a world in which AI, some
machine, is making the decisionabout who's dangerous and who's
(15:25):
not.
I also think when I talked aboutthat spiritual disintegration
that's happening in this countrythat facilitates this constant
state of fear that Trump andRepublicans want us to be in, I
think AI and technology has alot to do with that.
Uh I mean, I think people arelonelier than ever before, in
part because of their addictionto technology.
And when people get lonely, theyfirst get sad and then they get
(15:48):
angry.
Um, a lot of the people who weremarching on the U.S.
Capitol on January 6th, I thinkwere deeply lonely people.
Um, if you study, you know,these mass shooters, they are
almost routinely deeplyisolated, lonely individuals,
uh, many of which spiraled intoa violent dissent because of
(16:09):
their relationship withtechnology.
So I am very skeptical thatright now AI is on a trajectory
to be a net good for thiscountry, at least in the short
run, which is why I think you'vegot to be very careful about
kids' access to AI and kids'access to these friendship bots,
um, so that you can try to pushour activity on artificial
(16:34):
intelligence into the placeswhere it could unquestionably
create some good, like inhelping to study which
intervention programs work andwhich ones don't work.
SPEAKER_00 (16:43):
Well, I really appreciate it.
What what is next for you?
SPEAKER_01 (16:47):
Well, uh, we just had a very late night in the uh
uh in the Senate, um, asRepublicans are trying to fund
the Department of HomelandSecurity without any uh any
serious reforms.
Uh so um we're right now in themiddle of that effort uh trying
to um make sure that if we'refunding the government, we're
funding a lawful government, agovernment that obeys the laws.
(17:11):
So that's the fight that we justuh took a pause in late last uh
last night, uh heading intoThursday.
SPEAKER_00 (17:17):
All right, great.
Well, thank you so much forjoining the program.
I really appreciate it.
Uh best of luck to you.
Thanks, Jeff.
Thanks for everything you do.
Thanks for listening to theJeffalytics Podcast.
Be sure to subscribe and tolearn more, head on over to
ahdatalytics.com for moreinformation and previous
episodes.
If you like what you heard,please leave a glowing review,
which will help others todiscover the show.
(17:37):
Until next time, I'm Jeff Asher.
I'm Jeff Asher, and this is the Jeffalytics Podcast.
(00:03):
What actually drives change onan issue like gun violence?
Is it policy, culture, policing,or something harder to measure?
To help answer that question,I'm turning to Senator Chris
Murphy of Connecticut.
Senator Murphy has been one ofWashington's leading voices on
gun violence reduction, apassion that was shaped by his
experience in the aftermath ofSandy Hook, where he spent time
with families and saw firsthandthe impact of that tragedy.
(00:24):
In this episode, we talk aboutthe recent decline in gun
violence nationally, what rolefederal legislation and local
interventions may have played,and how the broader movement
around this issue has evolvedover time.
We also get into the challengesof communicating progress, why
fear can persist even when thedata improves, and how politics
and culture shape what peopleare willing to believe.
The numbers are moving in theright direction, but gun
(00:45):
violence is by no means solved.
This conversation with SenatorMurphy is about where the future
of gun violence reduction policyis heading.
Let's dive in.
My guest today is Senator ChrisMurphy from the lovely state of
Connecticut.
Senator Murphy, thank you somuch for joining me.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
Launching right in, um, what isyour background?
I'm really curious.
How did you obviously get intothe Senate?
(01:07):
Um, how does one do that?
And what motivates youspecifically to focus so heavily
on this work?
SPEAKER_01 (01:13):
Yeah, I I I guess everybody has a different path.
Um, you know, I've kind of beenan organizer my entire life.
I think I was an organizer bybirth in some ways.
When I was a teenager, I was,you know, organizing student
protests against an unjust highschool dress code.
I was the one who organized allthe touch football games in my
neighborhood as an elementaryschool and middle school
(01:34):
student.
You know, I had a passion as akid for environmental politics,
and I discovered that there wasthis thing you could do with
your pastime or your life,politics, where you organized
people for good.
And I became involved andaddicted to it at an early age.
So I was, you know, elected tolocal office when I was 24,
(01:56):
state office when I was 25, um,was the youngest senator when I
got here uh two terms ago.
And, you know, I still thinkthis is an honorable profession.
Uh, I've been doing it longenough that I've been able to
make some really positivechange.
The reason that I care so deeplyabout the issue of gun violence,
though, is, you know, because ofsomething that happened in my
(02:17):
state.
Um, I had not worked on theissue of gun violence when I was
in the state legislature, in thehouse.
You know, it was an issue Icared about, but was not a
priority issue for me.
And then um the Sandy Hookmassacre happened in between uh
when I was elected to the Senateand when I was sworn in.
And I was about the same age asall those parents.
I had kids who are just a littlebit younger than the kids who
were killed in Sandy Hook.
(02:38):
And uh, you know, either a lotof days that I wish I hadn't
been there.
Uh, you know, I was in thefirehouse as the parents were
being told what had happened inthe school.
Um, I spent a lot of time withthose parents.
I went to a lot of funerals andwakes in the following days and
weeks.
And and and, you know, I was aninterloper to their grief.
I don't want to overstate thethe way it changed my life, but
(02:59):
it did change my politicalcareer.
I mean, I that became the issuethat I woke up every day, uh,
the issue uh that dominated andhas dominated my career.
It's it's because of thatexperience in Connecticut.
SPEAKER_00 (03:10):
So I ask a lot of people this question, but I
think very few of them, probablynobody have asked to this point,
have your unique perspective onthis.
But you look at everythingthat's happened nationally,
enormous surge in murder in2020, and now we're seeing this
enormous historic decline.
To what do you attribute all ofthat that we're seeing in terms
of the falling murder,incredible fall in gun violence
(03:32):
over the last few years?
SPEAKER_01 (03:33):
Yeah, I I mean, I guess I don't have a better read
on it than anyone else.
Obviously, you know, it peakedduring the pandemic when people
were more desperate than everbefore, and it makes sense that
there was going to be a decline.
Sometimes, you know, there arejust sort of natural peak points
(03:54):
where you you sort of reach themaximum point of saturation.
But I don't think that it isunconnected at all to the state
and federal mobilization aroundthis issue.
I think the federal law wepassed in 2022 made a
difference.
(04:15):
Uh, I think the billions ofdollars we ended up spending in
anti-gun violence initiativesmade a difference.
But I think the movement itselfbecame so powerful over those 10
years, became so mainstream overthose 10 years that it did
fundamentally change the waythat people view this issue.
(04:36):
And I think the way in whichindividuals who may have been
contemplating gun violence as ameans to project power or to
deal with inner demons thoughtabout the decision to pick up a
gun.
Um, I don't think it's acoincidence that all of the
major decreases in gun violenceover the past 100 years come
(04:58):
after major federal debates overgun violence, whether it's the
two big bills passed in the 30sor the bills passed in 93 and
94.
I think when the federalgovernment sort of steps in and
signals, not just in a statutoryway, but in a moral way, that
we've had enough, I think thatends up having a cultural impact
(05:20):
as much as it does have a legalimpact.
SPEAKER_00 (05:24):
And sort of looking forward the next decade, the
next 15 years, what is thefuture of gun violence
reduction, the future of the gunviolence movement look like, gun
violence reduction movement?
SPEAKER_01 (05:36):
Yeah.
And one of the things that Ithink accounts for the
reductions is that um we gotgood during the period between
Sandy Hook and the shooting inUvaldi at recognizing
individuals who are in crisis orrecognizing a cycle of violence
before it played out andinterrupting uh the uh gun
(06:01):
violence before it happened.
Um, schools got a lot betterabout being able to monitor kids
that were in crisis.
We put a lot of programming outinto the schools to help them do
that in the cities.
We ended up figuring out how towrap services around a handful
of at-risk kids.
We figured out how to get to theemergency room when there was
(06:22):
one shooting to try to preventthe retributive shooting from
happening.
Uh, I think that's probably beenthe most important work.
And so as I look at the next 10years, I want to continue to
build a bipartisan coalitionaround supporting that work and
those interventions.
I think that's the easiest thingto do because it's not as
politically hot as changes ingun laws are.
(06:45):
But then, of course, I want toget the two big things done that
I think would make the biggestdifference, which is universal
national background checks and aban on assault weapons.
And I do think that we can getboth of those things done in the
next five to 10 years federally.
Um so, you know, to me, thoseare the two big projects.
SPEAKER_00 (07:03):
Is there a way forward on criminal justice?
Um, you've probably heard this,but Washington is pretty
divided.
This has been an issue where,especially on the reform side,
there's been a bipartisanconsensus, at least in the last
10 years.
Is there a way to build abipartisan consensus on gun
violence reduction that sort oftakes into account the gun
(07:26):
control versus gun rights debateand comes to sensible policy
solutions?
SPEAKER_01 (07:31):
Well, I certainly think there is.
Um, and you know, the evidenceis in the bill we passed in
2022, uh, that was a bill thatwas, you know, obviously not
everything I wanted, but it wasfive major changes in gun laws.
And we got 15 Republicans in theSenate, which is not a small
number to support it, with NRAopposition.
(07:53):
All the Second Amendment groupsopposed that bill loudly.
Uh, and we still got 15Republicans to support it.
And and some of them did thatbecause they, you know, actually
had a moral reckoning withthemselves and with the issue.
But others voted for it becausethey just feared that if they
voted against it, they would paya bigger political price back
(08:13):
home than if they uh voted forit.
So I think as we continue togrow the strength of the
anti-gun violence movementpolitically, we'll have a chance
to build on the 2022 bill.
I do think it, you know, ittakes a Democratic Congress.
So we will ha we passed thatbill in 2022 because we had
Democrats in charge of the Houseand the Senate, and a Democratic
president.
(08:34):
So it's still likely that theonly way you can make progress
on this issue is to haveDemocrats in charge of the
Congress and the presidency.
Um, but I think that that's youknow likely going to be where we
sit after Trump is done.
And I think we'll have anotherchance to make some progress.
SPEAKER_00 (08:50):
One of the major issues, and and really is it's
sort of at the center of thispodcast, is the fact that people
don't tend to believe good news.
They don't, they don't have agood perception of what's
happening in terms of crime andgun violence reduction and
things like that.
It have you thought about arethere ways to better communicate
that from sort of this highperch that you sit on that can
(09:11):
help people understand that yetthe issue's not done.
We're not, we haven't solvedthese problems, but they are
improving and these things areworking.
How do you go about doing that?
SPEAKER_01 (09:19):
Yeah, what a what an important question, but a really
big question.
And I'm you know deeplygrateful, Jeff, for the work
that you have done to tell thisstory of what has happened since
2022.
I mean, I still go into very,you know, highly politic
politically educated audienceswho are surprised to learn at
the massive declines that wehave seen in gun violence since
(09:41):
2022 and across the board,right?
You know, mass shootings,homicides, um, school shootings.
Uh so part of it is that we justhave to repeat it.
Uh, we are just not good attelling good news.
Um so I'd love it if all of mycolleagues that supported that
bill um told that story.
Um, but uh and and I'll try tosay very little about this, but
(10:04):
just to tease the topic.
Um, you know, the reason thatpeople don't know that all this
progress has happened is thatthe other side is trying to
constantly make people scared,scared of their neighbors,
scared of immigrants, um, scaredof people with different skin
color than them.
And they use crime as themechanism to do that.
(10:25):
It's a it's a tactic that works.
And so, you know, all they haveto do is talk about, you know,
one particular gruesome crime,and people assume that that's
what's happening everywhere.
Because we live in a countrywhere scare tactics work,
because we live in a countrywhere people are deeply anxious.
(10:46):
Um, it's a it's a it's aneconomy and a culture of
scarcity today, where peoplefeel like they have no hope, no
upward economic mobility, theyhave a harder time finding
meaning and purpose andconnection in their lives,
because we've structured aneconomy and a culture that is
really cold and consolidatespower in the handful of a few
number of people, and you canwork full-time and still not get
(11:08):
ahead, which makes you even moreanxious and makes you looking
over your shoulder to try tounderstand who's to blame for
the situation you're in.
So I think we've got to build acommon good economy.
I think we've got to build aculture in which we care about
each other and we have moreopportunities for a meaningful
connection with each other.
We still have to build ahealthier economy and a
healthier culture where peoplejust wake up every day a little
(11:30):
bit happier than they are today.
And if we do that, then thepolitics of demagoguery and
scare tactics won't work aswell.
And and if and if that's a atactic that doesn't work as well
for the right, then people willbe more willing to believe the
the actual data, the actualtruth that they are very, very
(11:50):
unlikely to be the subjects ofuh incident of gun violence,
less likely today than you know,ever before in the last decade.
But I think that's a toughmessage right now where
everybody feels so on edge andis willing to believe the worst
about um the intent of theirneighbors.
SPEAKER_00 (12:06):
Aaron Powell And sort of looking at it from the
totally opposite side, at somepoint this historic decline will
stop.
Hopefully it doesn't, we don'tsee an increase.
But at some point, somewhere,crime will will go up from this
low level.
Is there a responsible way tocapture the dynamic?
We see this a lot, especially in2020, it felt like from the
(12:26):
left, there was a lot of yes,murder's rising, but it's low,
or sort of minimizing that thisis a big problem that people
sometimes are rightfully scaredof crime while not automatically
going to the, you know, we theonly solution is tough on crime.
We have to be tough on thisproblem.
We need to incarcerate our wayout of this.
Uh is there a middle ground toacknowledge this problem while
(12:48):
not immediately trying to go tothe right as far as possible on
the toughness of this issue?
SPEAKER_01 (12:54):
Well, I mean, query why um Democrats, the left, have
made crime and gun violence twoseparate issues.
Um why don't why aren't they thesame issue?
When when we talk about crime,why aren't we talking about gun
violence and the responses togun violence?
(13:17):
Because that's the the crimethat people are most fearful of.
When people really talk aboutcrime, they are broadly talking
about violent crime.
And when you're talking aboutviolent crime, you're really
talking about a lot of gunviolence.
So I think it's strange that ourparty, you know, talks about gun
violence as one issue and crimeas another issue, which forces
(13:38):
us sometimes to find thesolutions for high crime in a
basket of policy ideas thatdoesn't include changes in our
gun laws, because changes in ourgun laws are in the gun violence
basket.
So if we want to get serious oncrime, we have to get guns out
of the hands of dangerouspeople.
(13:58):
And if a Republican says theycare about crime, but doesn't
want to change the gun laws,then they don't care about
crime.
And we've got to label peoplewho say they care about crime,
but want to make it easy for badpeople to get guns as
illegitimate and insincere.
SPEAKER_00 (14:17):
Last question, last general direction I kind of want
to talk about, because this isan issue that's been on my mind
a lot, is there a role for AI toplay in this debate or in the
gun violence reduction, criminaljustice reform process and to
actually play a role, but to doit responsibly and take
advantage of technology whilealso acknowledging sort of the
(14:38):
limitations of the technology?
SPEAKER_01 (14:39):
I don't know.
I mean, I think there's going tobe a lot of downsides uh to how
AI could be deployed in thisfight.
I'm sure there are upsides.
Obviously, you know, there'sbeen a lot of good efforts to
try to map gun violence, um, totry to understand the places
where you need to deployresources as we're trying to
figure out which interventionswith at-risk young people works.
(15:02):
AI can probably help us get gooddata.
But AI could also facilitatedangerous profiling of
individuals who really aren't athreat, but AI may deem a
threat.
AI has biases that are inherentin it.
Uh, and I don't want to stepinto a world in which AI, some
machine, is making the decisionabout who's dangerous and who's
(15:25):
not.
I also think when I talked aboutthat spiritual disintegration
that's happening in this countrythat facilitates this constant
state of fear that Trump andRepublicans want us to be in, I
think AI and technology has alot to do with that.
Uh I mean, I think people arelonelier than ever before, in
part because of their addictionto technology.
And when people get lonely, theyfirst get sad and then they get
(15:48):
angry.
Um, a lot of the people who weremarching on the U.S.
Capitol on January 6th, I thinkwere deeply lonely people.
Um, if you study, you know,these mass shooters, they are
almost routinely deeplyisolated, lonely individuals,
uh, many of which spiraled intoa violent dissent because of
(16:09):
their relationship withtechnology.
So I am very skeptical thatright now AI is on a trajectory
to be a net good for thiscountry, at least in the short
run, which is why I think you'vegot to be very careful about
kids' access to AI and kids'access to these friendship bots,
um, so that you can try to pushour activity on artificial
(16:34):
intelligence into the placeswhere it could unquestionably
create some good, like inhelping to study which
intervention programs work andwhich ones don't work.
SPEAKER_00 (16:43):
Well, I really appreciate it.
What what is next for you?
SPEAKER_01 (16:47):
Well, uh, we just had a very late night in the uh
uh in the Senate, um, asRepublicans are trying to fund
the Department of HomelandSecurity without any uh any
serious reforms.
Uh so um we're right now in themiddle of that effort uh trying
to um make sure that if we'refunding the government, we're
funding a lawful government, agovernment that obeys the laws.
(17:11):
So that's the fight that we justuh took a pause in late last uh
last night, uh heading intoThursday.
SPEAKER_00 (17:17):
All right, great.
Well, thank you so much forjoining the program.
I really appreciate it.
Uh best of luck to you.
Thanks, Jeff.
Thanks for everything you do.
Thanks for listening to theJeffalytics Podcast.
Be sure to subscribe and tolearn more, head on over to
ahdatalytics.com for moreinformation and previous
episodes.
If you like what you heard,please leave a glowing review,
which will help others todiscover the show.
(17:37):
Until next time, I'm Jeff Asher.
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