The FBI processed about two background checks a second on Black Friday, as Americans bought a record-setting number of guns, according to data released earlier this week by the agency.
The National Instant Criminal Background Check System processed 185,345 requests on Nov. 27 – more than it ever had before in a single day. That’s probably an underestimation of the day’s total gun sales, however: U.S. law only requires background checks for people who buy from larger gun retailers.
Last Friday’s record-setting purchases occurred as a man shot three people to death and wounded nine others at a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado Springs.
WATCH: FBI outlines steps they are staking as San Bernardino investigation continues
READ MORE: Gun violence by the numbers: How America, Canada and the world compare
On Wednesday two people opened fire at a banquet hall in San Bernardino, Calif., killing 14 people and injuring another 21.
The previous record for the most background checks in a single day was Dec. 21, 2012, roughly a week after 20 children and six adults were shot to death in a Connecticut elementary school. After the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary the processing of gun background checks saw a spike of 953,613 in one week.
WATCH: President Barack Obama addressed the shooting in San Bernardino, Calif. Thursday
Wednesday’s shooting was the deadliest in the United States since Newtown. President Barack Obama reiterate the need for stricter gun control legislation.
“The one thing we do know is that we have a pattern now of mass shootings in this country that has no parallel anywhere else in the world,” Obama said in an interview with CBS News.
“We should never think this is something that just happens in the ordinary course of events because it doesn’t happen with the same frequency in other countries.”
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