Currently, gun regulation is politically impossible. The Republican party has worked with the gun manufacturer’s lobby (the NRA) to make gun ownership a totem, an obsession among conservatives. Republicans won’t vote for even minor gun regulation of the sort large majorities of Americans favor.
To pass federal gun regulation, the Democrats need to control the Presidency, the House, and have 54+ votes in the Senate, enough to overcome the members of the party who vote with Republicans on close bills. And even that would not be enough. The Supreme Court has been packed with Republican extremists. In 2008, the Court invented a personal write to own military weapons, and the Court now has more Republican extremists–any significant law passed by Democrats faces a likely veto by the Court. With the Court vetoing all the state gun control measures, they certainly would throw out a Democratic federal gun regulation bill.
So what *can* be done? I would look to the last time Republican favored gun regulation. In 1967, when Reagan was governor of California, he signed a ban on carrying loaded guns without a permit. Why? Because the Black Panthers were encouraging blacks to carry guns.
Is the US still racist enough for this to work? Certainly. So if group, say Arm African Americans (AAA), were to very publicly encourage blacks and other minorities to walk around strapped, that would quickly change the politics of gun regulation. Encourage 18-year old gang members to carry guns at all times–a lot of these kids don’t have criminal records, so they can. This will get cops behind gun regulation.
Start minority gun clubs. Hold gun parades and gun events in public spaces. Encourage people at marches to publicly carry guns, and minorities to carry guns in public. The Republican press may applaud this at first, but they will soon start fear-mongering like they do. Urban areas will be even more ‘dangerous’ to conservatives, and they will encounter armed minorities in public all over. I can’t see the Democratic party pushing for this, but other democratic-minded groups could start this. Is this a little crazy? Yes, but there is no sensible path to gun regulation in the US.
Within a few years, Republicans will start voting for gun control and the Supreme Court will *discover* new legal theories making the laws enforceable.
