Nearly 3/4 of Dems Want Federal Govt to Track Gun Owners, but GOP, Independents Say Back Off

Democrats applaud the idea of the federal government keeping a list of every gun owner in the country. But, Republicans flock to say it's a bad idea.

While the federal government currently does not keep track of potential gun buyers whose names are submitted for background checks, and no such list is being proposed, individual states do keep lists of licensed gun owners and those with concealed weapons permits.

Rasmussen took voters' temperature to see if a federal proposal had any merit. Democrats overwhelmingly support it, with 71 percent of likely Democratic voters saying they favored it.

Meanwhile, on the other side, Republicans and Independents want to keep the federal government out of the Big Brother role. Sixty-eight percent of GOP respondents said they were opposed to the idea, while almost as many Independents -- 60 percent -- also said no.

The survey of 1,000 likely voters was conducted on March 30-31 by Rasmussen Reports. The margin of sampling error is +/- 3 percentage points with a 95 percent level of confidence.