• James Macinko, Diana Silver, Duncan A Clark, and Jennifer L Pomeranz.
• Department of Health Policy and Management, Fielding School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California; Department of Community Health Sciences, Fielding School of Public Health, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, California. Electronic address: jmacinko@ucla.edu.
• Am J Prev Med. 2023 Oct 1; 65 (4): 649656649-656.

IntroductionFirearm violence is a public health crisis. Most states prohibit local firearm laws, but some states have laws that allow for lawsuits and other penalties against local governments and lawmakers who pass firearm laws deemed preempted. These punitive firearm preemptive laws may reduce firearm policy innovation, discussion, and adoption beyond preemption alone. Yet, it is unknown how these laws spread from state to state.MethodsIn 2022, using an event history analysis framework with state dyads, logistic regression models estimate the factors associated with adoption and diffusion of firearm punitive preemption laws, including state-level demographic, economic, legal, political, population, and state-neighbor factors.ResultsAs of 2021, 15 states had punitive firearm preemption laws. Higher numbers of background checks (AOR=1.50; 95% CI=1.15, 2.04), more conservative government ideology (AOR=7.79; 95% CI=2.05, 35.02), lower per capita income (AOR=0.16; 95% CI=0.05, 0.44), a higher number of permissive state firearm laws (AOR=2.75; 95% CI=1.57, 5.30), and neighboring state passage of the law (AOR=3.97; 95% CI=1.52, 11.51) were associated with law adoption.ConclusionsBoth internal and external state factors predict the adoption of punitive firearm preemption. This study may provide insight into which states are susceptible to adoption in the future. Advocates, especially in neighboring states without such laws, may want to focus their firearm safety policy efforts on opposing the passage of punitive firearm preemption.Copyright © 2023 American Journal of Preventive Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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