A little over a year ago, President Joe Biden announced the creation of the White House Office of Gun Violence Prevention, to be overseen by Vice President Kamala Harris. The office is led by Director Stefanie Feldman, a longtime Biden policy aide, and Deputy Directors Greg Jackson and Rob Wilcox, who both had experience in gun violence prevention.
With legislative action on gun violence stalled in Congress, the mandate of the office was to ensure the implementation of existing laws and executive actions; develop additional measures that could be taken without Congressional approval; and build connections with politicians, gun violence survivors, and gun reform activists across the country.
When the office was first announced, advocates for gun reform were excited about the opportunity to accelerate change through a dedicated federal hub.
“I was ecstatic, because we always felt that there needed to be a whole of government approach to ending the gun violence crisis in our nation,” said Po Murray, chairwoman of the Newtown Action Alliance, who was involved in the coalition that lobbied the administration to create an Office.
One year later, Jackson said the office has taken action on all four of its original goals: implementing the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act, identifying additional executive actions the president can take to address gun violence, enhancing partnerships with leading cities and states, and coordinating federal government responses to communities affected by gun violence.
“Living right under the president and vice president’s leadership, we’ve been able to have a huge authority to help implement the work [by] partnering with our agencies and other parts of government,” Jackson said in an interview with the AmNews.
Stakeholders say they are pleased with what the office has done so far, and hope to see its capacity expanded through greater funding and more staff.
“I think they’ve surpassed expectations,” said Josh Horwitz, a longtime gun reform advocate and current co-director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Violence Solutions. “I think the one question is what happens in the future with a new administration? Are they going to get permanent funding?”
November’s presidential election may determine the fate of the office. It is funded through money that Congress appropriates to the White House each year, and many believe it is more likely to continue under a Kamala Harris presidency than a Donald Trump one, given their political leanings.
Here are some of the actions the office has taken so far.
Implementing the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act
The scope of the office’s power is limited, as any major change to the gun regulation landscape would have to come from new laws passed through Congress. The office was created in the face of the administration’s struggles to make progress on its legislative priorities, which include an assault weapons ban, a national red flag law, and universal background checks. The office has instead focused on implementing existing laws and new executive actions.
Currently, the office operates as a four-person team. Jackson said the bulk of their day-to-day work within the federal government involves collaborating with staff at other agencies to advance their policy goals and develop new ideas.
One example of this collaboration comes through the office’s efforts to implement the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act (BSCA) of 2022, which was the first federal legislation on gun violence in almost three decades. Activists identified this work as one of the most significant actions the office has taken so far.
“The Bipartisan Safer Communities Act had many proposals in there that needed to be implemented, so it was imperative that there were people in the office working day and night to ensure that the implementation process went well,” Murray said.
One goal of the BSCA was to reduce the number of guns sold without background checks—a major source of illegal firearm trafficking—by broadening the category of gun sellers required to obtain a Federal Firearm License. Before the law, people for whom the sale of firearms did not constitute their main source of income were not required to obtain a license and did not have to run background checks.
This exception was known as the “gun show loophole” because these dealers often sold their firearms at gun shows, but it also applied to sellers who sold their firearms online or at other informal venues.
To ensure proper enforcement of the BSCA’s new policies, the office worked with the Department of Justice (DOJ) to introduce a rule that clarifies what types of commercial activity indicates that a seller should obtain a license. In effect, the rule requires those who sell firearms at flea markets, gun shows, or online to register for a license and run background checks.
The DOJ estimated the rule would apply to 23,000 dealers when it was announced, but did not respond to requests for data on its impact so far. The rule has faced legal challenges in states like Florida and Texas since its adoption in May, but remains in effect in most states.
Another pillar of the BSCA was its allocation of $250 million in federal funding toward community violence intervention programs. Community violence intervention (CVI) refers to a multitude of community-based strategies to provide services and mentorship to people most likely to engage in community gun violence, which disproportionately affects Black and Brown communities. The federal government has invested a further $150 million in CVI through annual appropriations from Congress, bringing the total amount distributed to $400 million.
Four community-based organizations in New York each received a $2 million grant from the DOJ through its Community Based Violence Intervention and Prevention Initiative. One of those organizations is Getting Out Staying Out (GOSO), which serves East Harlem.
GOSO’s CEO Michelle Pryce-Screen said the funding has helped bolster their CVI program, Stand Against Violence East Harlem (SAVE).
“Thanks to this funding, 200 participants in the SAVE program are now able to access GOSO’s Pathways to Graduation, job readiness, and career placement programs and therapy from our new satellite mental health clinic,” she said by email.
Building connections on the ground
Beyond federal policy actions, Jackson also highlighted office efforts to connect with people across the country who are working to prevent gun violence.
As part of its Safer States Initiative, Jackson said the office has formed partnerships with state lawmakers in 31 states to help them pass gun reform laws at the state level; 17 states have passed new laws so far, including safe storage laws in California and Rhode Island, and a ghost gun ban in Vermont. In addition, Maine, Maryland, and Pennsylvania have created state Offices of Gun Violence Prevention after encouragement from the White House.
Brian Kavanagh, a Democratic New York state senator, attended a convening of state legislators that the White House Office organized last December to advance the initiative. The event allowed lawmakers from different states to share advice about passing gun reform laws. For example, Kavanagh said he discussed how New York passed its red flag law with the help of healthcare providers.
“For people who may be earlier in the process of trying to pass that [law], they [could] hear very specifically from legislators [about] how health care providers were engaged and how important they were in those efforts,” he said in an interview after the event.
Evidence of the efficacy of red flag laws (also known as extreme risk protection orders) in preventing homicides or mass shootings is limited, but they have been shown to reduce suicides. In general, research shows that states with more strict gun laws have fewer gun-related deaths.
The office has also built out an emergency response system, designed to provide federal support in the aftermath of incidents of mass violence.
“The most robust deployment we’ve had was in Lewiston, Maine,” Jackson said, referring to the mass shooting last October where 18 people were killed.
“We sent representatives from all 10 agencies and nearly 100 federal government employees out to the community to help with everything from school reopenings to emergency mental health support, to therapeutic support, to engagement directly with first responders and law enforcement,” Jackson said.
The office has kept an open line of communication with gun reform groups as well, meeting with them regularly to provide updates and receive input.
“They have had a number of briefings throughout the year to keep us abreast of what they’re doing, what they’ve accomplished, what they hope to accomplish,” said Yasmín Fletcher Braithwaite, the deputy director of federal policy at Giffords Law Center.
In addition to these briefings, the office has hosted a variety of in person convenings to connect with those affected by gun violence. In March, Oresa Napper-Williams attended a White House event for mothers from Black and Brown communities who had lost children to gun violence. Napper-Williams created the Harlem-based nonprofit Not Another Child after her son Andrell was killed in 2006.
“[We learned] about a lot of things that the White House was doing as far as legislation and funding,” she said, adding that the survivors also shared what they were working on in their communities.
An uncertain future
“Establishing the office and funding it to begin with is a good first step, but it definitely needs more funding, it needs more capacity, and it needs more reach to really disrupt the cycle of gun violence that we all live in,” said Hudson Munoz, executive director of Guns Down America,
His viewpoint was echoed by other gun reform advocates.
“I think that they’re doing a good job with listening to concerns, but I do also know that the office doesn’t have enough capacity to really address all of the concerns, because it’s made up of a three- or four-person team,” Napper-Williams said.
Munoz also said he wanted to see the office take on more of a role in highlighting the dangers of gun ownership. “What I would like to see them do in the future is help shift the conversation away from the regulation of guns and the prosecution of gun crimes toward a new politics of rejecting guns,” he said.
Jackson acknowledged that “there’s a great deal of work to be done with limited resources in our current state.”
The biggest challenge the office faces right now is a sense of limited time, he said.
“When I think about challenges, I think about how much more time we have to keep doing this lifesaving work, and how can we build on and strengthen this momentum of this administration,” he said.
Jackson said he was more hopeful the office would continue under Kamala Harris than Donald Trump, who is aligned with the National Rifle Association and other gun rights lobbyists.
“We can’t predict what will happen, but we do know the [previous Trump] administration has been very clear that they’ve done nothing on this issue on purpose, and so I think that’s a clear indicator of what the future could be or could hold for these types of efforts,” Jackson said.
For now, the office shows no signs of slowing down. On September 26, Biden announced the passage of further executive action focused on combating emergent firearms threats like 3D-printed guns and improving school shooter drills.
The DOJ is also reviewing a proposed rule to reform victim compensation, a federal program designed to provide financial assistance to victims of violent crime. The AmNews has reported on inequities in the current system.
Advocates are holding out hope that the office continues, no matter the outcome of the election.
“I would hope under either administration that the office continues,” Fletcher Braithwaite said. “It is vitally important, and it would be a huge disservice to this country for this office to go away. It would undermine public safety, and it would have a detrimental impact on the work that the office has already done.”
Shannon Chaffers is a Report for America corps member who writes about gun violence for the Amsterdam News. Your donation to match our RFA grant helps keep her writing stories like this one; please consider making a tax-deductible gift of any amount today by visiting https://bit.ly/amnews1.