Gun Control & RKBA

McSweeney said the gun rights issue was already churning in Powhatan before Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund, a gun-control group backed by former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, bought $700,000 worth of ads, but “that just ginned it up another notch.”

Others, such as Democratic political strategist Paul Goldman, insist that the Powhatan vote represented backlash against the Bloomberg spending, but neither campaign considered the gun-control issue decisive in the race.

“I don’t see the gun issue as one motivating a lot of people to come out,” Gecker said. “I think that’s a misread.”

Sean Houlihan, a Washington political consultant who is close to the Everytown group, said Powhatan actually contributed a smaller proportion of votes to the district total than in 2011 and Watkins won a higher percentage of the vote there than Sturtevant.

Houlihan said the ads may have helped turnout in Richmond and with Republican-leaning women in the Chesterfield suburbs. “Who can say $700,000 in a Republican district didn’t make the race a lot closer than it would have been?” he said.

However, Holsworth said, the Bloomberg spending, accompanied by outside advertising by the National Rifle Association for Sturtevant and Americans for Responsible Solutions for Gecker, “put an edge on it that was unmistakable.”

Sturtevant’s campaign regarded the Bloomberg ad buy as a temporary distraction. The campaign responded quickly to the initial Everytown ads, but then returned to the bread-and-butter issues Sturtevant emphasized — the economy and jobs; government spending and taxes; education and reform.