Pandemic, protests cause soaring gun sales

LYNNWOOD, Wash. — New numbers from the FBI showed more people applied for background checks last month than at any other time since the bureau started keeping records.

Gun sales are especially strong in the North Sound, where KIRO 7 News met Dillon Hauck as he went from gun shop to gun shop.

“I ask (employees) about a certain firearm, and they said, ‘We’ll get it in when it gets in. We can’t say the timeline of it,’” he told KIRO 7.

Hauck’s search for a specific gun lasted an entire morning.

“A lot of places are sold out of their stock right now, so I was just curious to see what they had in the (Lynnwood Gun) store,” he said.

In June 2020, across the country, nearly 4 million people applied for background checks.

According to the FBI, that is the most people since record-keeping began 22 years ago, with women making up a growing percentage of new gun buyers.

“It’s the craziest thing,” noted Tiffany Teasdale, owner of Lynnwood Gun. “Nobody in the nation, in the gun industry, has seen anything like this when it comes to sales.”

Teasdale said her sales had already doubled because of the pandemic.

Just when things were leveling off, she said her sales spiked even more because of the national conversation about defunding the police.

According to Teasdale, it’s resulted in a backlog of orders that could last months.

“I have no idea what’s going on in this nation when it comes to getting all that stuff in,” she told KIRO 7.

“Just the couple places I’ve been to, I got a general sense it’s gonna be that way everywhere,” added Hauck, regarding the shortage in guns at firearms shops.

At this rate, Teasdale said some types of firearms will not be delivered to her shop until at least November.

Nationwide, the FBI reported gun sales were up 136% in June 2020, compared to a year earlier.

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