But many gun rights advocates say they fear she will reopen the door for cities and states to ban private ownership of handguns, pointing to her repeated comments questioning a key US supreme court decision on gun ownership. Even liberal second amendment experts have called some of Clinton’s explanations of her position “odd”.
As one law professor who supports gun rights put it, Clinton on guns is like a Republican politician who claims she supports abortion rights, even as she opposes Roe v Wade.
At the final presidential debate last week, Clinton reiterated her position that the supreme court was wrong in its 2008 decision in District of Columbia v Heller, which overturned Washington DC’s ban on handgun ownership, as well as a law that required other guns in homes to be “kept nonfunctional”.
In a controversial 5-4 decision, the court ruled that Americans have a constitutional right to have and use firearms in their homes for self-defense.
