Democrats running for president have thrown off years of caution to aggressively advocate tough new gun laws, a response to a shocking series of mass shootings as well as changes in the country’s political makeup.

The turnabout has been on clear display since last week’s massacre in San Bernardino. In the aftermath, Democratic Senate leaders immediately forced votes on several gun control efforts, knowing they would lose, but wanting to draw a sharp, public line. The party’s presidential candidates have also emphasized the issue at every opportunity.

The advocacy breaks with more than two decades of belief that gun control was a losing issue for Democrats.

The sentiment crystallized when Republicans seized control of the House in 1994, in part because of a backlash against an assault-weapons ban signed into law by President Clinton. Then, when Vice President Al Gore lost his home state of Tennessee and the traditional Democratic stronghold of West Virginia in 2000 — costing him the White House — it hardened into a near certainty that gun control was political poison.

http://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-gun-politics-20151210-story.html