The NRA’s influence concentrates in primaries, not general elections

Evidence

In genuinely competitive general elections, the NRA’s political clout is considerably weaker than the political power attributed to it (Johnson, 2012). In many of these races the NRA-backed candidates win the primaries but lose in general elections despite heavy financial backing from the NRA. — Albert Bandura, Moral Disengagement, 1230

Categorization

Category: Contrarian or Surprising Claims

• XREF: Challenges the popular image of NRA invincibility, consistent with the broader finding in political science that interest group clout is overstated in general elections.

Related

• The NRA’s feared power is an artifact of primary politics, not general elections (similarity 0.97)
• Small dedicated groups can exercise electoral power beyond their numbers (similarity 0.82)
• Low primary turnout lets organized minorities defeat established incumbents (similarity 0.82)
• A dedicated single-issue group can dominate an apathetic electorate (similarity 0.80)
• Well-organized extremist factions exploit low primary turnout to unseat even ideologically aligned incumbents (similarity 0.79)