Ahh, the good ol’ days . . .
[E]ven as Trump brags about the overall stock market, which has continued the incredible run that began in March 2009, gun stocks have been shot down. Since election day 2016, Sturm, Ruger & Company, Inc. RGR, -1.96% has fallen 13% (through Friday) while American Outdoor Brands Corporation AOBC, -0.10% has plunged 65%. Both stocks soared during the Obama era.
The gun industry needs someone it can trot out to scare people. It now has House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who has already gotten two gun control measures passed, both aimed at broadening the federal background check system for firearms purchases. The Republican-controlled Senate certainly won’t pass these measures, and even if it somehow did, the White House has promised a swift veto.
But with all due respect to Pelosi, you know what the NRA really needs? A bogeyman (or woman) in the White House it can use to scare its base—which skews older, white, male and rural—into thinking that the government gun grabbers are coming. Plenty of Democrats seeking the presidency have vowed action on guns; the NRA—if it can stop squabbling—will have a new target soon enough.
– Paul Brandus in Why the gun industry misses Obama