People with concealed carry permits are among the most law-abiding groups in the United States. Police officers have crime rates far below the general population. People with concealed carry permits are more law-abiding than police officers.
The arrest rate for the overall adult population in the USA is about 2,100 – 2,200 per 100k in recent years. The arrest rate for police officers has been about 170 per 100k. This may be low because no one officially tracks police arrests. Officials may be reluctant to charge police officers. The conviction rate for concealed permit holders is about 17.6 per 100k in Texas, according to an academic paper by John Lott, Moody, and Wang published in 2025. From the paper:
Of the 43,932 total convictions in the Texas DPS 2023 report, only 284 — or 0.6 percent — were convictions of LTC holders, a conviction rate of 17.6 per 100,000.
Convictions are not the same as arrests. Arrests for felonies tend to result in about 65% convictions. Arrests for misdemeanors result in about 45% convictions. A conviction rate is likely to be about half of the arrest rate. If we double the conviction rate to approximate the arrest rate, concealed permit holders have less than one-fifth the arrest rate of police officers. Concealed carry permit holders have an arrest rate 1.7% lower than the general population.
The Crime Prevention Research Center (CPRC) sums up how law-abiding permit holders are for convictions of firearm-related violations:
Concealed handgun permit holders are extremely law-abiding. In Florida and Texas, permit holders are convicted of firearms related violations at one-twelfth of the rate at which police officers are convicted.
Minnesota tracks the number of carry permits that are revoked each year. A look at the Minnesota numbers shows that revocations of permits are close to the number of concealed permit convictions in Texas. The numbers and methodology may be significantly different in the two states. In 2024, the number of permit holders in Minnesota was about 400 thousand. The number of permit revocations was 47. That is a revocation rate of 11.5 per 100k in 2024.
The crime rates of permit holders are much, much lower than those of the general population and much lower than those of police officers.
Very few people believe disarming the police is a good idea. Police officers, even retired police officers, have the legal right to carry in most places where most people are prevented from carrying weapons. Police officers have the legal right to carry in all states and territories of the United States.
Congress created the LEOSA Act as a way to protect the public with more responsible armed people on the streets. They also created it as a way to protect police officers. The same logic applies to people with concealed carry permits. Those people are much less likely to break laws than even police officers are.
It is common sense to increase the number of such protectors. There are about 700 thousand sworn police officers. There are about another 500 thousand retired officers. There are over 20 million Americans with concealed carry permits.
About Dean Weingarten:
Dean Weingarten has been a peace officer, a military officer, was on the University of Wisconsin Pistol Team for four years, and was first certified to teach firearms safety in 1973. He taught the Arizona concealed carry course for fifteen years until the goal of Constitutional Carry was attained. He has degrees in meteorology and mining engineering, and retired from the Department of Defense after a 30 year career in Army Research, Development, Testing, and Evaluation.
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