From: januarybaybee@gmail.com   
      
   The 2018 midterm elections may have exposed a shift on gun control   
      
      
   Gun control advocates didn’t get every win they wanted, but there were some   
   big victories.   
      
   Gun control advocates didn’t get all the wins they were hoping for on   
   Election Day, but all in all, the 2018 midterm elections were pretty good for   
   supporters of stronger gun laws.   
      
   First, the one statewide ballot initiative regarding guns, which strengthened   
   Washington state’s gun laws by curtailing access to assault rifles, won.   
   That’s not exactly shocking in a liberal state, but it’s a notable victory   
   nonetheless — one    
   that the National Rifle Association (NRA) is certainly not happy with.   
      
   That’s not the end of the story, though. Gun control advocates also poured a   
   lot of time and money into specific candidates. They saw some wins in this   
   area, particularly in the House and governor’s mansions, and some losses,   
   especially in the Senate.   
    But even in some of the losses there are promising signs for gun control   
   advocates that they may be closing the political intensity gap that has long   
   held them down.   
   Gun control wins in the House   
      
   Alex Yablon and Daniel Nass at the Trace highlighted the House wins:   
   “Democrats earning F ratings from the NRA for their views on gun laws   
   prevailed not only in increasingly bluish swing states such as Virginia,   
   Nevada, Wisconsin, and Colorado, but    
   also in conservative strongholds like South Carolina and Kansas.”   
      
   These were Democrats running strongly on guns. One of the victorious   
   Democrats, Jason Crow, “became the poster boy for proudly pro-gun reform   
   Democrats in twin late-season articles in the New York Times (‘Bearing F’s   
   From the NRA, Some Democrats    
   Are Campaigning Openly on Guns’) and Washington Post (‘Suburban Democrats   
   Campaign on Gun-Control Policies as NRA Spending Plummets’) summing up the   
   new political dynamic in swing state suburbs,” Yablon and Nass wrote.   
   A mixed story in the Senate   
      
   It didn’t go quite as well for gun control advocates in the Senate, where   
   candidates with strong NRA support won in Indiana, Missouri, and Tennessee.   
      
   But even in some of the Senate Republican victories, there is good news for   
   gun control advocates.   
      
   In Florida, Republican Rick Scott, a foe of gun control advocates and   
   especially Parkland activists, seems to be on track to defeat Democratic   
   incumbent Bill Nelson (although the race appears set to go to recount). That   
   would normally seem like bad news    
   for gun control advocates, given that Nelson is more supportive of stronger   
   gun laws.   
      
   But this was complicated by the NRA’s recent turn on Scott, who is currently   
   Florida’s governor. After the Parkland school shooting, Scott signed a slew   
   of measures that strengthened the state’s gun laws. The measures were by no   
   means    
   groundbreaking — merely raising the minimum age to buy guns from 18 to 21   
   and adding a waiting period for firearm purchases. But they were significant   
   enough to get the NRA to pull back its support for Scott, even downgrading him   
   in their candidate    
   scorecard from an A+ to a C.   
                                                          ___________________   
   Nov. 12, 2018   
      
   Stronger gun law stance helps Democrats in midterms   
      
   The Gun-Safety Issue Is Actually Helping Democrats   
   Midterm election results suggest that the power of the N.R.A. may be   
   diminishing.   
      
   https://static01.nyt.com/images/2018/11/12/opinion/12Spitzer/12S   
   itzer-jumbo.jpg?quality=90&auto=webp   
      
   - snip -   
      
   Consider first the public environment. According to Pew Research Center   
   analysis, more Americans now favor gun regulation (52 percent) over gun rights   
   (44 percent), a reversal from 2016. And 57 percent say gun laws should be   
   stricter, compared with 52    
   percent in 2017.    
      
   A recent Kaiser Foundation poll found gun policy to be the third most   
   important concern of voters, behind health care and the economy.  Similarly,   
   Election Day exit polling found the same rank order, except that gun policy   
   was bumped to fourth by    
   immigration — a position it probably would not have lost but for President   
   Trump’s strenuous efforts to exploit immigration anxiety.   
      
   An NBC News exit poll reported that 60 percent of voters favored stronger gun   
   laws, including 42 percent of gun owners.   
   - - -    
   In the money race, gun-safety groups apparently topped the N.R.A., which has   
   spent about $11 million in the midterms. Combined gun-safety group spending   
   was about $12 million — a first at the national level. If the amount of   
   N.R.A. spending seems low,    
   it is: The organization spent twice that in 2014 and five times that amount in   
   2016.    
      
   By its own admission, the N.R.A. has money problems. It has also suffered   
   political black eyes from corporate boycotts, allegations of improper ties   
   with Russian agents seeking to influence the 2016 elections and relentless   
   political attacks by the    
   student-led movement that arose from the Parkland school shooting.   
      
   [Thank you, President Obama] .......   
      
   So why the sea change in public attitudes and emboldened candidates running   
   squarely on gun safety?  The answer begins 18 years ago.  After Al Gore’s   
   2000 defeat, Democrats decided, rightly or wrongly, that the gun issue was a   
   poison pill for them, so    
   they all but abandoned it.     
      
   This left the national gun debate mostly in the hands of the gun-friendly Bush   
   administration and gun-rights supporters. That one-sided national debate   
   turned public attitudes more strongly in favor of gun rights.    
      
   Democratic silence ended with the 2012 Sandy Hook school shooting and   
   President Obama’s decision to promote stronger gun measures in Congress.     
      
   The effort failed, but it began a new kind of political momentum as new and   
   well-funded gun-safety groups formed, grass-roots mobilization and   
   fund-raising dedicated to gun safety increased, mass shootings continued and   
   candidates began to speak about    
   the issue.   
      
   https://www.nytimes.com/2018/11/12/opinion/gun-control-congress-   
   ass-shooting.html   
      
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