From the Monkey Cage: Will the Media Treat Navy Yard Like Newtown?

When events - like the recent Navy Yard shooting - occur, usually there is a call for some type of response. A look through the history of significant pieces of legislation shows that quite often their passage follows some type of event which created a window of opportunity for the passage of the law. Often the media plays a role because they highlight the issue and keeps it on the minds of both the public and of public officials

But that seems less and less the case with stories about gun control following mass shooting.

Monkey Cage contributor Danny Hayes shows how media attention to gun control waned quickly after the Sandy Hook shooting and is likely to do the same after the Navy Yard shooting.

Like with other shootings, gun control coverage increased dramatically after the Newtown massacre, but tailed off within a few weeks. But in contrast to other cases, gun control arrived back on the front page in early January, when President Obama issued a series of executive actions intended to reduce gun violence.

The president’s influence, however immediate, was short-lived, as media attention fell off through the early spring. It was only in April – when a Senate bill to expand background checks failed to surmount a filibuster – that the issue gained prominence again.

Since the bill’s demise, gun control has largely disappeared from debates on Capitol Hill – and with it, the news. While advocates have continued to push for change at both the state and federal levels (with one group coincidentally on lobbying trip to Washington this week), the national media’s interest has continued to wane. Even Giffords’ nationwide tour in July failed to stop the slide.

This pattern suggests that only if Sen. Dianne Feinstein gets her way, with Congress taking up gun control legislation once again, will a renewed media debate over gun control occur. If political leaders in Washington decide the issue isn’t worth pursuing, the media are likely to turn their attention elsewhere – whether back to Syria, the next NSA intelligence-gathering revelation, or the looming battle over the debt ceiling.

This suggests that gun control is less likely to be passed into law because it is less likely to get on, and stay on, the public's and Congress' agenda.