TOPEKA, Kan. (AP) — Kansas Home members superior a invoice Wednesday that may decrease the authorized age to hold hid firearms in Kansas from 21 to 18 for individuals who full a background verify and endure security coaching.
Eighteen, 19-, and 20-year-old Kansans can already carry firearms within the open in Kansas. Proponents of reducing the age for hid carry mentioned that these beneath 21 can serve within the army and are eligible to vote. Opponents countered that these beneath 21 are much less mature and extra vulnerable to risk-taking
If handed, the invoice would considerably enhance the variety of college and school college students in Kansas eligible to hold hid firearms on campus. However the laws received’t change present legal guidelines that enable excessive colleges to ban weapons on college grounds, in response to the Kansas Affiliation of Faculty Boards and the Kansas Nationwide Schooling Affiliation, which opposes the invoice.
Rep. Stephen Owens, a Hesston Republican, led the transfer on the Home ground and mentioned his curiosity stems partly from somebody making an attempt to abduct his college-age daughter at a Wichita fuel station final yr. As a 20-year-old, she wasn’t eligible to hold a hid gun.
“It’s that straightforward: Both they’re adults at 18, or they aren’t, and we have to plan accordingly,” Owens advised The Related Press. “They will serve in our army, they’ll vote, they’ll do varied different issues as adults. They need to have the suitable to guard themselves.”
