A year after the horrific shooting in Newtown last December, one can be forgiven for thinking nothing’s changed in America’s gun debate. We still haven’t seen any major new federal laws passed, and President Obama’s push for expanded background checks and restrictions on high-capacity magazines went nowhere. Democrats in Congress still talk about revising the Obama proposals but most have given up hope of anything passing soon. Gun advocates remain committed to stopping Congress from passing any new laws, so much so that they even killed a proposal this week to expand the ban on undetectable guns to apply to all-plastic, 3D printed guns.

Nonetheless, the gun debate has changed in significant ways since the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School. The gun control movement is reinvigorated after being moribund for nearly two decades. Today, thanks largely to Michael Bloomberg, there’s real money flowing into campaigns to support candidates favoring more restrictive gun laws. And, while legislation is stalled in Congress, a host of new laws have been passed at the state level. Of course, the gun advocates remain a powerful political force. Yet for the first time in years they have serious competition in the political marketplace. The gun debate is now more evenly matched than it has been in a long time.

After Republicans took the House in 1994, Democrats in Washington decided to steer clear of the gun control issue. They blamed the Republican victory on President Clinton’s support of two major gun control laws, the Brady Background Check law and the now-expired ban on certain military-style (or “assault”) weapons. Fearing that gun control was politically toxic, Democrats practically made it a plank in the party’s platform to Avoid Gun Control At All Costs. If nothing else, Newtown radically changed the Democrats’ political calculations. President Obama had barely mentioned gun control during his first term, even earning an F (!) rating from the Brady Center, one of the nation’s leading gun control advocacy groups. After Newtown, however, Obama moved gun control to the very top of his second-term agenda. While his push failed, it established gun control as an issue of national priority.

We’ve also seen a wave of new money flowing into elections to support pro-control candidates. For the past 30 years or so, nearly all the money that went into campaigns went to anti-control candidates. The NRA and gun enthusiasts spent millions to elect candidates opposed to new gun control laws. By contrast, the Brady Center and other gun control groups were struggling just to stay afloat and couldn’t afford to be active contributors. Since Newtown, more political money than ever has gone to the side seeking new restrictions. Led by New York’s outgoing mayor, Michael Bloomberg and his Independence USA political action committee, gun control advocates have spent considerable funds on races from Virginia to Illinois to Colorado. In the Virginia gubernatorial race, Bloomberg’s PAC outspent the NRA by a wide margin—and helped secure a victory for Democrat Terry McAuliffe in the NRA’s own home state.

http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115905/newtown-shooting-anniversary-how-tragedy-changed-gun-debate