ANNA firearm legislation during Kansas' 2025 legislative session was limited and took a back seat to tax relief and voting reforms. Even so, legislators entertained a handful of bills having to do with gun safety, education, safe storage and suicide prevention, joining me Anna Kaminsky on the Kansas reflector podcast today to discuss the attempts at firearm legislation, is Shannon. Little. Shannon has been a volunteer with the public safety and gun violence prevention organization Moms Demand Action since 2018 she is the organization's Kansas chapter leader. Thank you so much for being here, Shannon, thank you for having me so tell me a little bit about the state of Kansas' gun laws as they exist today. What's changed in recent years? Or Has anything changed in recent years?
Relatively few things have changed in recent years. We have some of the most lax got gun laws in the country. We were able to pass some legislation to keep firearms out of the hands of domestic abusers. But as there, there have been other gun laws that have passed, like lowering the age of getting a concealed carry permit and also, oh, gosh, I'm trying to think of what it was. Sorry, I'm going blank. Then the other, I think that is changed too, is that anyone can carry a concealed, uh, handgun anywhere now. So yeah,
one piece of legislation this year expands the constitutional right to bear arms in Kansas. It hasn't progressed much this session, but tell me your thoughts and why it's important to pay attention to
so house concurrent resolution 5006, would expand the right to bear arms in Kansas, which is comes down straight from the United States Constitution to the Kansas constitution, would expand that to ammunition and accessories, which, in in just the hearing of it sounds like it's really great, and that's something that we want, and we we do as Moms Demand Action support the Second Amendment. But I think that this bill would also have a lot of unintended consequences. One of those unintended consequences would be that any type of law that we would want to pass in Kansas going forward, that might regulate ammunition or accessories, you know, such as keeping very dangerous bullets, the bullets that Pierce metal and armor, out of the hands of Kansans, or any other kind of accessory that would make firearms more dangerous and not less dangerous, we wouldn't Be able to pass, or it would be very difficult for those bills to pass, and once they did pass, they would be subject to the analysis of strict scrutiny, which is the very hardest test, legal test for bills to be able to pass that we just we wouldn't be able to pass anything in the future if the will existed in Kansas to pass some laws that limited accessories and ammunition and that could potentially put a lot more people at risk, including law enforcement. So there would also be the risk that people could challenge laws that limited their ability to have a firearm or have accessories or ammunition. Now, who might be prohibited because they have been convicted of certain crimes from having those firearms and accessories and ammunition. Now they could challenge that prohibition in court that could really clog up our legal system, and it could also enable people who are dangerous criminals to have firearms and the accessories that they are seeking to have
another piece had to do with the Eddie Eagle program. Can you tell me a little bit about the program? I know it's sponsored by the National Rifle Association and. Of why it's a cause of concern for Moms Demand Action.
Sure, so the Eddie Eagle program in theory sounds like a great program. It's teaching children to stay away from firearms if they are to encounter them, which is a great idea, but and something I would encourage talking to your children about but it puts the onus on children to be the ones to prevent gun violence and harm upon themselves or others from guns that are not being attended to by adults. As Moms Demand Action. We really like to reinforce and educate on the idea that it's always an adult responsibility to keep firearms away from children. So while it's a good idea to teach your children to stay away from firearms if they ever encounter them, we want it to start a step further upstream. We want the adults to be the ones who are securely storing those firearms, not hiding them in their bedside drawer under their mattress on the top closet shelf. We want the adults to be securing those firearms in either with a gun lock or in a gun safe, but not putting that that onus on children, that decision and that moment of of danger on children. The other issue with that is that it's comes from the NRA, which has historically been more supportive of a guns everywhere agenda, and they are encouraging children's children to see firearms in a friendly and not hostile way. There's a cartoon eagle and his cartoon friends. And you know, they, they kind of make you feel okay about the NRA and about guns, if you're seeing that, and that's not necessarily. I think the message that that we support conveying to kids about how you need to be safe around firearms, firearms can be useful, but there's also a great deal of danger and responsibility that go along with them, and having the NRA and a cartoon Eagle may not be the best way to teach those things to kids. Can you tell me a little bit about Moms Demand actions, ideal approach to educating kids about being around firearms? I think that might be a nice segue into the bill that you guys proposed this year and a half for the last three years. Yeah, our focus and approach is to actually teach and educate adults, parents, caregivers of children, about secure storage of firearms. We have a program that branches off from what we do. It's called Be smart for kids, you're just making sure that all your firearms are securely stored, and recognizing that firearms play a huge part in gun suicide, talking to your peers about gun violence, making sure that that everyone knows that if you securely store a firearm, the chances that there will be an unintentional shooting, shooting by a minor go down dramatically.
And tell me a little bit about the child access prevention bill. It's House bill this year, House Bill 2167 what's been its progress this session? And can I, can you give us a little bit of background on the bill itself? Sure,
a version of this bill has been introduced in previous legislative sessions and it has not, had been granted a hearing by legislative leadership in committees that it's been introduced that bill would require firearm firearm owners to securely store their weapons. There would be a penalty for if their weapons are ever used in the commission of a shooting, if their firearm is not securely stored, it would incentivize gun owners to responsibly store their firearms, and would definitely put the responsibility on secure firearm storage on adults and not kids, right?
Can you tell me what safe storage means you mentioned, you know, not underneath the mattress or in a bedside table drawer? Is it in a locked box in a safe is it up on a high shelf where. Where do we begin and end with safe storage.
So secure storage, a great example would be keeping your firearm and your ammunition locked and stored separately. The access to the safe or the lock would only be accessible to the adult or adults in the household, or wherever it may be, so somewhere where a child can't access I know that's not always desirable, and we one thing we have to talk about a lot with these child access laws is in our rural and western parts of Kansas that aren't as urban as some of the cities here, people are using their firearms as tools, and so how do we talk about secure storage in those types of situation? But ideally, you're going to want to keep your your ammunition and your gun box separately. A lot of this also helps reduce gun suicide. Gun suicide is 68% of gun violence in Kansas, and if you are in a moment of crisis and you have to stop and think about, how do I access some ammunition? How do I access a firearm? I need to find keys for both. I need to go unlock them. I need to to figure out where the safe is. Where do I get these things in that time that can be time that people have to reconsider, and that can buy them the time they need to contact someone, call 988, do whatever type of work they need to do that may lead to them not committing Suicide, right?
And that's been shown in research, I believe, is that that extra step between the thought, for instance, the suicidal ideation, and accessing the firearm to go through with it, the extra step makes a huge difference. On that same topic, there was a bill from a Merriam Democrat, Jared Owsley representative, Jared Owsley this session, it was House Bill 2379 I think it was called the Voluntary do not sell list act. Can you tell me a little bit about that and how that ties in with suicide prevention? Sure,
yes. So this is, a bill that would allow an individual in Kansas to contact the KBI and put themselves on a do not sell list. So if they go to a federally licensed firearm dealer who conducts background checks, or someone who is licensed to sell firearms has to conduct a background check, they would then see that this person is on the KBS list, and they would say, I'm sorry you're on this list. I can't sell you a firearm. And that would be completely the individual's choice. No one would be forcing them to do that. They can also remove themselves from the list just as easily as they can get on the list, so it's not infringing on their Second Amendment rights, aside from the safety precautions that they want to take on themselves.
Yeah. And the interesting part of this bill too is the access to those forms to essentially sign yourself up for that list. It was either you could get it online or you could ask a healthcare provider or healthcare taker or healthcare worker. Excuse me, can you talk to me a little bit about the importance of having that connection with healthcare workers when dealing with a bill like this?
I think that if you are requesting this in for this, this exemption from health care worker, then that helps a health care worker identify someone who may be in crisis and needs help, and then they're able to connect them with the resources that they would need. So I think that's a benefit of talking to a healthcare provider about acquiring the form.
How is this bill different than, for instance, what other states have done with red flag laws risk assessment, I guess, not necessarily confiscation, but removal of firearms from someone's home or from their person related to mental health and behavioral health. Why is this? What does this make sense for Kansas, rather than something like. That Red Flag Law? Well,
there are a spectrum of suicide prevention interventions when it comes to gun violence, and this is on the lower end of that spectrum. There are other interventions with along the spectrum that are even lower than this, that don't require a policy intervention, such as asking a friend to keep your firearms, giving someone notice that you're you're having suicidal ideation. There's a whole spectrum, and this kind of is just the very edge of the policy end. And I think it has to do with wanting to not politicize this issue. And I think that when you start to talk about red flag laws, it becomes a lot more political, because it is all the way at the furthest end of the spectrum, because it people feel that it deals more with your Second Amendment constitutional right, but anyone Who is subject to being evaluated to have a firearm taken from them under a red flag. Lot does have due process of law, and it's kind of a complicated legal discussion to have sometimes. So I think it's it's easier to start at the end of the spectrum that can do a lot of good that the most people can agree on and hopefully get something really good past if most people can agree on it. Because, you know, as we know, we have some challenges on getting really helpful things past. Sometimes if we can't get enough people to agree,
do you anticipate supporting that bill, that proposal, next year, because it didn't make it very far this year, and if it comes up again,
right? Yeah, I definitely think we would, to whatever extent is helpful for that bill to do the most good for the most people in Kansas is what we would do to help it get passed. It got a hearing in a committee, which is really fantastic, and the people who testified on the bill were very strong and passionate advocates for themselves, for loved ones who died by gun suicide, that this bill could have helped. I think there are a lot of Kansans that really recognize how deep of an impact gun suicide has on our state and on Kansans that are willing to support that bill
and looking forward ideally to next year, what? What were your priorities look like? In addition to that particular bill you mentioned, the one that you've proposed for the past three years has struggled to get a hearing. Is that where your focus will remain. Are there other other things ideally that you would like to lump in?
I think that we as moms would like to continue to advocate for child access prevention laws, and then as concerned involved with gun violence prevention advocates in Kansas, we would definitely be supporting the self exemption law opposing things that aren't good, such as the Eddie Eagle, if there's any other kind of expansion of bad gun laws in Kansas, we're kind of, we have very few gun laws, so we that are that are beneficial to gun violence prevention. So there's not too many on that that end, but we would oppose those as Kansans. And
before I let you go, can you tell me a little bit about what Moms Demand Action does here in the state, and when the legislature is not in session and you don't have to be stuck in committee, meetings and hearings and all that kind of thing, what you and what you do the rest of the year? Sure,
yeah, what we do the rest of the years, we reach out to our communities different organizations within our communities, and we let them know that there is an advocacy organization in Kansas that supports gun violence prevention. We look for ways that gun violence impacts. Mix that organization or our communities, and we try to make those connections and grow the movement of Kansans who are concerned with gun violence prevention. We are fortunate, and that I fortunate probably not the right word, but we don't have any examples recently of any types of mass shooting incidents in Kansas, but that's not to say it couldn't happen. And so the more we can educate and talk to people about gun violence in Kansas, all types of Gun, gun violence, gun violence in communities, gun suicide, the more we can make Kansans aware that gun violence touches their lives in different ways that they maybe haven't thought of. We can get more and more people involved in this movement so that our work hopefully can reduce the likelihood that there ever would be some sort of mass shooting incident. We can address gun suicide. We can address gun violence in cities, gun violence in rural communities. We really work to try and build a coalition through lots of different local organizations trying to increase our outreach, we go to different events. We like parades, festivals. We have tables. We participate in suicide prevention events, awareness and prevention. We participate in pride events. We participate in Juneteenth, Juneteenth events. We also have an event that honors victims and survivors of gun violence in June, called wear orange. It's the first weekend of June. Usually, local groups throughout the state will pick an activity. I know in Wichita, they have a blood drive, because people who are injured with a firearm lose more blood than other types of injuries. In Johnson County, they usually have a big parade in a park. We also advocate at the local level and at the school district level for secure storage laws or not. Laws, I'm sorry, resolutions, where orange resolutions. So just a variety of it's a lot of it is awareness. A lot of it is trying to grow our movement here in Kansas.
And if someone listening would like to get involved or learn more about what you do, where can they go? Besides, they're a parade or an event or something like that.
So I would, I would say that the best place to start is going to Moms Demand action.org, and then you can go to a drop down menu of find an event. And once you do that, you look by state. You can find Kansas. You can also text, 64433, you can text, oh, gosh, I don't know what to text. Sorry. I'm like, Can I look it up? Act Yes, you can text act 264433, that will get you connected with our system, and you'll start to get some information about where you can participate and get active. We also have a demand action app that is really fantastic resource. I know some people cringe when they think about getting another app, but I think it's chock full of information that you can just access it anytime that's convenient for you. It's a little bit more interesting than going on Instagram or Facebook for too long, and it's, it's got a lot of actions you can take from your phone. It's got a lot of stories and articles to read. It's, it's a great combination of a lot of different things. And I think it's under utilized, but hopefully if we get the word out more, it will get more use. And it's a great tool. You can sign up for events there. You get sent reminders from there. Yeah, it's really it's a lot of fun. You get to see what people are doing in other states as well, which can provide some inspiration when you feel like you're a blue dot and a big red sea.
So Shannon little, the Kansas chapter leader of Moms Demand Action. Thank you so much for joining us today. Welcome.
