In wake of Texas shooting, Greg Abbott points finger at Chicago, using tired GOP cliche

CHICAGO – In the wake of this week’s horrifying elementary school shooting in Texas, Gov. Greg Abbott deflected calls for stricter gun laws by trotting out a longstanding Republican talking point: “I hate to say this, but there are more people shot every weekend in Chicago than there are in schools in Texas.”

First off, governor, I don’t think you hate to say it. I think you and your GOP buddies love to say it, because you say it every single time there’s a mass shooting and you need a cudgel to swing around at the idea that gun control might help control guns.

Abbott continued: “And we need to realize that people who think that, well maybe if we just implement tougher gun laws, it’s gonna solve it – Chicago and L.A. and New York disprove that thesis. And so, if you're looking for a real solution, Chicago teaches that what you're talking about is not a real solution.”

Those would be excellent points if they weren’t easily disproven in about two Google searches and also wholly offensive to people in a city like Chicago.

Willful deceit about Chicago violence

I’ve lived here for two decades, so I’ve grown accustomed to hearing Chicago brought up by opportunistic politicians as the prime example of a Democratic-led city in chaos and proof-positive that gun laws are meaningless wastes of time.

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Before I explain the willful deceit behind comments like Abbott’s, let me say clearly: Chicago does have a horrible violence problem. It’s not unusual to read about a dozen people, often more, killed over a weekend in the city, much of it to do with gangs. I call it the weekend’s grim tally. We lose children with frightening regularity. It’s something that has plagued this city for decades, and no politician has ever shown the will to take the wide-ranging steps necessary to make a difference.

But while we are often labeled “the murder capital,” we aren’t. Not even close.

At least 800 people were killed in Chicago last year, but as staggering as that number is, it’s a city of 2.7 million.

Why do shootings keep happening? Because this is who we are.

If you look at murder rates in cities with populations greater than 100,000, Chicago doesn’t even break the top 20.

Chicago is not the most violent city

The top five cities with the highest murder rates, according to data assembled by CBS News, are: St. Louis; Baltimore; Birmingham, Alabama; Detroit; and Dayton, Ohio. You’ll also notice, not that it matters, that four of those five cities are in states with Republican governors.

So we’re not the most dangerous city in the country by a long shot. But when people like Abbott throw the name Chicago out, it’s almost always attached to a claim or an assumption that the city has “the strictest gun laws in the country.”

That’s completely false, and it has been for more than a decade. In 1982, Chicago enacted a ban on handguns. That ban was struck down by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2010.

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Two years later, the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals struck down the state of Illinois’ ban on concealed carry.

According to the Annual Gun Law Scorecard produced by the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence, the current top five states with the strictest gun laws in the country are California, New Jersey, Connecticut, Hawaii and Massachusetts.

Guns come in from other states

The reason my city is awash in guns is simple: We’re surrounded by states with lax gun laws – like Indiana and Wisconsin – and the majority of guns used in violent crime here come from out of state.

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A 2017 Chicago Police Department report found that 60% of the firearms recovered in the city come from out of state, "with Indiana as the primary source for approximately one out of every five crime guns."

Alexandra Filindra, a political science professor at the University of Illinois Chicago and an expert on gun policy, recently told WLS-TV: “If we don't have uniform laws, in a system with a free market across the states, we know that this is going to continue to be an issue.”

Peddling a lie helps no one

Chicago doesn’t have anywhere near the highest murder rate in the country, it doesn’t have the strictest gun laws and it suffers mightily from the lack of federal gun laws that could put reasonable restrictions on the purchase of deadly weapons.

We have problems unique to this city – decades-long gang activity that carves entire swaths of Chicago into tense territories; pockets of poverty in long-ignored neighborhoods on the city’s south and west sides; a lack of economic opportunity; often a lack of hope. Easy access to firearms makes all those problems measurably worse.

My son never came home from Sandy Hook. My heart bleeds for Texas as I relive Dylan's murder.

We’re not an example of gun regulations failing. If anything, Chicago is the poster child for stronger national gun regulations.

So, Gov. Abbott, I grieve the loss of life in Uvalde along with the rest of the country. You clearly have gun problems in your state that demand serious attention.

So maybe give those problems the attention they deserve and put hackneyed claims about my city to rest. You said yourself you "hate to say" it. Next time, just don't.

Follow USA TODAY columnist Rex Huppke on Twitter @RexHuppke and Facebook: facebook.com/RexIsAJerk

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This article originally appeared on USA TODAY: Texas Gov. Greg Abbott wrongly cites Chicago to denounce gun control