Texas bans 'red flag' laws that allow guns to be taken from owners in crisis

Source: Washington Post

The state also relaxed restrictions on owning short-barrel guns, including sawed-off shotguns.

Texas lawmakers handed a series of victories to gun rights advocates in the recently wrapped legislative session, making it easier to possess certain firearms while banning “red flag” laws that allow court authorities to temporarily remove guns from people who might be a danger to themselves or others.

Gov. Greg Abbott (R) signed those bills and about 600 other pieces of legislation in a flurry of weekend activity before the veto deadline Sunday. The laws take effect Sept. 1.

Lawmakers voted to loosen gun restrictions days after the anniversary of the May 24, 2022, rampage in Uvalde, Texas, where a shooter killed 19 fourth-graders and two teachers, which ushered in a wave of calls for stricter gun laws in the state.

Texas’s move to relax firearms regulations comes as deaths from gun-related accidents, homicides and suicides outrank car crashes and cancer as the top cause of death among children ages 1 to 17, according to the most recent data from the Center for Gun Violence Solutions at Johns Hopkins University. And a study published this month in the journal JAMA Pediatrics linked states with “permissive firearm laws” to an increase in pediatric firearms deaths compared with states with tougher regulations.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2025/06/24/texas-gun-laws-2025-red-flag-shotgun/