The Atlantic

The Congressional Stalemate Over Guns and Immigration Isn't Going Away

It's the result of cultural, demographic, and economic divides that are only going to grow.
Source: Saul Loeb / Getty Images

The dim odds that Congress will respond to the Parkland school massacre with meaningful gun control and the flickering prospects it will pass immigration reform both reflect the same obstacle: the widening trench between the forces of transformation and restoration in American politics.

The convergence of the two policy debates today—with the nation reeling from Wednesday’s shooting in Florida and the Senate voting down an array of proposals on immigration—is coincidental but revealing. Both issues illuminate the central divide between the parties as their political coalitions have sorted and separated along lines of race, generation, education, and geography. On both matters, Republicans are championing primarily non-urban and predominantly white constituencies that want fewer immigrants and more access to guns. Democrats reflect a mirror-image consensus: Their voters coming from diverse urban areas usually support more immigrants and fewer guns.

The likelihood that Congress will ultimately stalemate on both issues—refusing to adopt any new restrictions on access to firearms and deadlocking over extending new protections to young people, 84 percent of adults said they supported background checks for all gun purchases (65 percent strongly), and 68 percent said they supported a ban on assault weapons (53 percent strongly).

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