‘Unwilling to accept defeat’: How Sinema and Murphy clinched guns deal for Dems

In a Washington run by Baby Boomers and octogenarians, it took two 40-something Democrats with a yin-and-yang approach to get a gun safety deal done.

Chris Murphy had developed self-described “pessimism” in his decadelong quest to rein in gun violence. That’s where Kyrsten Sinema came in, pushing her more liberal friend along.

Their partnership proved exactly what Democrats needed to break through on gun safety after nearly 30 years of attempts. They’re close enough for the triathlete Sinema to give Murphy fitness advice. But the Connecticut progressive also credited the Arizona centrist with maintaining “optimism” that he sometimes struggled to muster.

“I’ve tried every tactic in the book to get this body to act and I’ve never been successful. And so I have a bit of PTSD about negotiations. Kyrsten just was convinced from the very start that this was possible,” Murphy said in an interview on Thursday. “We needed that.”

The Senate’s Thursday night passage of its bipartisan gun safety bill marked a seminal moment for a Democratic Party that pushed through background check mandates in 1993’s Brady Bill but has struggled ever since to reassemble that coalition. Behind this year’s effort is a duo who reflects their party’s ascendant Generation X as well as the future of the caucus: a coalition of stalwart liberals and Sun Belt moderates.