The Lone Star State has reached a new milestone with more than one million active, concealed handgun licenses in the state.
The New York Times found that there are 1,017,618 active licenses in Texas as of April 30. Twenty years ago, when lawmakers passed the concealed-handgun law, there were just over 113,000 people with active licenses.
That number of active licenses is almost equal to the population of San Antonio.
Grant Miller, a CHL trainer at Nardis Gun Club, says he isn’t surprised by the milestone. He says classes have been at full capacity across the board for months, aided in part by January’s open carry laws, which made getting a license quicker and easier.
Texas does not lead the nation and that distinction belongs to Florida, with 1,743,954 active licenses.