Colorado’s most competitive congressional district holds an infamous distinction in the history of American mass shootings: It was where 12 students and a teacher were gunned down at Columbine High School in 1999 and where 12 died in the Aurora movie theater massacre in 2012.
These tragedies have produced some of the nation’s loudest calls for tighter gun control in the past two decades, yet voters in the metro Denver district have in the past five elections backed Republican U.S. Rep. Mike Coffman, a strong supporter of Second Amendment rights and someone who has won backing from the National Rifle Association.
This juxtaposition is one that Democrats want to spotlight in their latest effort to dislodge the incumbent — a potentially risky move in a state where firearms are often a political third rail and an issue that hasn’t helped the party win the 6th Congressional District seat in years past.
But gun control advocates and others on the left say it may work in November because they see a shift in attitudes toward firearm regulations in the wake of recent shootings, such as the one at a Parkland, Fla., high school that sparked a series of marches in Washington, D.C., Denver and many other cities across the U.S. and around the world.
The end result is an election that is being watched by the major parties and advocates on both sides of the issue for signs whether gun control can be part of a winning strategy for liberal candidates in Colorado and across the nation.
“People are running on this issue,” Mark Kelly, the husband of former Arizona congresswoman and gun-violence survivor Gabby Giffords, said during a recent Colorado stop to promote attorney Jason Crow, one of the Democrats who want to challenge Coffman this fall.
“We can win,” Kelly, a former astronaut, added. “We can win at the ballot box, and then pass safer legislation. … The politics on this issue is changing, and it’s changing pretty quickly.”
So is this election cycle the one where gun control helps Democrats break through? Or will pursuing the issue hamper what is otherwise shaping up to be a good year for the party, with a near-record number of announced Republican departures from Congress, including House Speaker Paul Ryan, amid broader GOP turmoil?
“Democrats are making the bet that somehow, post-Parkland, times have changed,” said Eric Sondermann, an independent political analyst in Denver. “They didn’t change post-Columbine, they didn’t change post-Sandy Hook and they didn’t change after a dozen other incidents. In the past, not only did the issue not work, but if you flash back to the early part of this century, there was a backlash to this issue.”
Coffman’s seat, which he has maintained with a vise grip, has long been a target of Democrats and a focus of national media attention because of its apparent vulnerability for Republicans. Hillary Clinton won the district by 9 percentage points in 2016, and President Barack Obama took it by 5 points in his re-election year of 2012.
Yet Coffman has been able to fight off challenger after well-funded challenger by mostly large margins since taking office in 2008.
And while the district’s boundaries and demographics have changed — Columbine hasn’t been within its confines since the 2010 election cycle — Democrats have continued to campaign on gun control despite their repeated losses.
There are signs, however, that Republicans are at least paying attention to the idea that firearm regulation could be an influence in the 6th Congressional District this year. The National Republican Congressional Committee, which works to elect party members to the U.S. House, recently attempted to paint Crow as a hypocrite because the law firm where he is a partner has represented the firearms industry. (Crow’s campaign said he never had anything to do with the lobbying arm of his firm.)
Some polls have shown growing support for tighter gun restrictions, and there has been increased activism — much of it in the widely attended “March for Our Lives” events six weeks ago.
Crow, an Army veteran who served tours of duty in Iraq and Afghanistan, is the Democratic front-runner in the race to unseat Coffman. He says gun control is among the top issues in his campaign.
“There’s no risk embracing this, and I’m not afraid to take a leadership role on this issue,” Crow said. “This is something that I’m hearing a lot when I’m out in the community. I’m hearing this issue come up a lot because parents are fed up with being afraid to send their kids to school, teachers are afraid to go to work and teach their kids in this environment, and kids are afraid to go to school.”
Crow is calling for expanded background checks before gun sales, a ban on high-capacity magazines and bump stocks and on military-style weapons and their accessories. He also wants to bar people on the federal “no fly” list from buying guns, ease the restriction on federal gun-violence research and enact a “red flag” law that would let judges take firearms away from people they deem to be a threat to themselves or others.
Levi Tillemann, another Democrat who wants to challenge Coffman this year, seeks to go even further. Tillemann wants to mandate a 10-day waiting period for all gun purchases and create laws that dictate how firearms must be stored.
“You don’t need a gun faster than 10 days,” the former Obama administration official said. “If you need a gun faster than 10 days, you need a police officer, not a gun.”
Over his congressional career, Coffman has received more than $30,000 in direct contributions from the NRA and thousands more in outside spending by the organization. He also has been endorsed multiple times by the group with an “A” rating for his votes, including in 2016. Those include his support for legislation to make state concealed-carry permits recognized across the U.S.
While the NRA money is just a small portion of the roughly $15 million Coffman has raised since he was first voted into office in 2008, it has nevertheless been a target this year of Democrats and gun control advocates. Crow has called for Coffman to return the money, and a billboard has even popped up in Aurora highlighting the funds.
(For all the funds that the NRA has directed toward Coffman, gun control groups that want to defeat the congressman also have donated thousands to Democratic candidates — and have spent even more during elections on their behalf. That includes high-dollar advertisements in the past year for Crow.)
However, guns don’t seem to be playing a central role in Coffman’s re-election campaign. At a district assembly recently, he didn’t delve into the gun control debate while speaking to party insiders who ultimately got him on the ballot.
“I respect the Second Amendment,” the former Marine and combat veteran told The Denver Post. “I think there are some reasonable restrictions around the Second Amendment. Of course, I think the big thing is enforcing the laws that we already have and getting the system to work that we have now. It doesn’t seem to be working.”
For all the Democratic attacks claiming Coffman isn’t tough enough on guns, the congressman says he is working on a prospective federal “red flag” law, like the one supported by Crow.
He has also urged the Trump administration to ban bump stocks and, after a Texas church massacre involving a shooter who received a bad-conduct discharge from the Air Force, he pushed the military to make sure it was properly reporting people who shouldn’t be able to purchase guns.
On top of his congressional action, Coffman also has been discussing gun violence with students, school superintendents, school security officials and others since the beginning of March to hear their concerns and figure out what preventive steps can be taken.
The shooting at the Waffle House this weekend has made clear the need for red flag laws in this country.
— Mike Coffman (@RepMikeCoffman) April 23, 2018
He disagrees, however, with any prospective ban on assault-style weapons and has resisted other gun-control efforts.
A raucous town hall Coffman held in February was a big indicator, though, that at least some of his constituents want the congressman to do more to rein in gun violence, with many jeering at him to act.
Cristen Mazzella, a doctor and unaffiliated voter from Centennial, said after a Crow event this month that she has never supported Coffman for several reasons, although one is currently at the forefront.
“The gun issue at the moment,” she said of her problems with him. “Otherwise, I’ve always been on the fence.”
But for some GOP voters, the idea of limiting gun rights is a nonstarter.
That could mean winning over single-issue voters will be an impossible task even as Colorado Democrats have made it clear that gun control is something they are going to tackle head on this year.
“It’s almost like malpractice if you don’t make this a significant part of your campaign,” said Ken Toltz, a Democrat who in 2000 lost in the 6th Congressional District against former GOP Rep. Tom Tancredo.
Toltz announced his campaign four months before the Columbine shooting, when the school was in the district, and gun violence became a centerpiece in the race. In the end, voters chose Tancredo, who somewhat softened his resistance to gun control.
“It’s gutsy,” Toltz said of Crow’s embrace of gun control as a central campaign issue. “With the atmosphere in Washington, and somewhat in the Colorado legislature as well, there is a feeling that you have to be out there with your views. This is not a time to sit quietly.”
But where Toltz sees courage, Tancredo — who has been critical of Coffman for not being conservative enough — sees danger for Democrats.
“I still don’t believe that it’s a winning issue,” he said. “Things may have changed so much that I may be wrong, but I don’t think so.”
The Democratic candidate to face Coffman in November will be decided in the June 26 primary election.
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