Explaining Landrieu’s Gun Vote

Three red-state Democratic senators up for re-election next year – Mark Begich (D-AK), Mark Pryor (D-AR) and Max Baucus (D-MT) – voted against the gun background check measure this week, but not Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA).

Stu Rothenberg explains: “Landrieu always depends on a huge turnout in the black community and a near sweep of the black vote to win election, and voting against the president on guns might have poisoned her relationship with that community. And if Mary loses black voters, Mary can’t win… Obviously, Landrieu needs to hit certain percentages of both black and
white votes to win, but if politics starts with base voters, Landrieu
knows which voters she can’t afford to lose during her 2014 re-election
bid.”