Last summer, two candidates for the Republican nomination for governor of Minnesota took two approaches to the issue of gun safety.
Former Gov. Tim Pawlenty took a nuanced position. While saying he thought the 2nd Amendment protects individual gun owners, the former governor endorsed a ban on bump stocks; supported broadening universal background checks, saying he would like to see that system extending on a voluntary basis to non-licensed gun sales.
His opponent, Jeff Johnson, went in another direction: He opposed all restrictions on the sale and ownership of guns beyond current laws.
It hasn’t been lost on Republican elected officials that Pawlenty was defeated by Johnson when Minnesota Republicans voted in the August primary. But it also wasn’t lost on them that Johnson was defeated when the electorate included all voters in the November general election.
Now, Democrats who took control of the state House want to push several gun safety bills, and are arguing that Republicans who still control the Senate should heed the general election results, especially the results the Twin Cities suburbs. While there were many issues at play in those races (Donald Trump being first among them), one of the issues that delivered House control to the DFL was gun safety.
As House Speaker Melissa Hortman said at a first-day-of-session rally with the gun safety group Moms Demand Action: “You elected this majority. And you have put us in a position to move legislation forward, to get legislation passed the floor of the Minnesota
