Americans’ support for stricter gun-control measures has fallen to its lowest level since 2014, according to a poll released Wednesday by Gallup.

The results of the October survey come as the number of violent crimes, including murder, has risen and after Americans purchased a record number of guns in 2020.

According to the poll, 52% of U.S....

Americans’ support for stricter gun-control measures has fallen to its lowest level since 2014, according to a poll released Wednesday by Gallup.

The results of the October survey come as the number of violent crimes, including murder, has risen and after Americans purchased a record number of guns in 2020.

According to the poll, 52% of U.S. adults say they want stricter gun laws—down from 67% in 2018 after a mass shooting at a high school in Parkland, Fla., left 17 people dead. Democrats overwhelmingly support stricter measures in the recent survey, while 24% of Republicans do; 11% of U.S. adults polled say they want less-restrictive laws.

The percentage of Americans who support a ban on the possession of handguns fell to 19%, the lowest rate ever recorded by Gallup. Support peaked at 60% when Gallup first asked the question in 1959. The highest recorded rates of support that Gallup found for stricter gun-control laws were in the 1990s.

The number of homicides in the U.S. rose nearly 30% in 2020 from the prior year to 21,570, the largest single-year increase ever recorded by the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The violent-crime rate rose 5.2% last year compared with the previous year, while the property-crime rate dipped 8.1%, according to the FBI.

According to the poll, 52% of U.S. adults say they want stricter gun laws, down from 67% in 2018.

Photo: Mark Felix/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images

Gallup found that 88% of U.S. gun owners now say they own a gun to protect themselves against crime, up from two-thirds in 2005.

Jeffrey M. Jones, a senior editor at Gallup, said that along with crime, the election of a president who has called for new gun laws contributed to the declining support for gun-control measures.

Following a string of mass shootings this spring, President Biden called on Congress to pass sweeping new gun restrictions. They included an expansion of background checks for people seeking to buy guns and a ban on semiautomatic weapons with high-capacity magazines, such as AR-15-style rifles. He also ordered new rules for untraceable weapons known as ghost guns and arm braces used to steady AR-style pistols. Congress hasn’t passed any new gun laws.

President Biden announced a new strategy in June to combat growing gun violence in cities, including going after rogue gun dealers and using Covid-19 relief money to fund hiring law-enforcement personnel and community investments. Photo: Mandel Ngan/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images The Wall Street Journal Interactive Edition

The Gallup survey found that 31% of U.S. adults say they own a gun, a number that has remained little changed for more than a decade.

The number of federal background checks for gun purchases hit an all-time high in 2020 of 21 million, according to an analysis of federal data by the National Shooting Sports Foundation, an industry trade group.

Write to Zusha Elinson at zusha.elinson@wsj.com

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