When Democrats win, so does the gun industry

The NRA, gun makers and investors all owe President Obama a Texas- sized thank- you card. They’re going to miss him when he leaves the White House.

Having a boogeyman like Obama to frighten your base is great for business. Since he was elected president, the gun industry has been stoking fears that he’d confiscate guns and do away with the Second Amendment. And the money’s been rolling in faster than you can empty an AR- 15 magazine at your firing range.

Look at these stats that track Obama’s tenure, from the National Sports Shooting Foundation ( NSSF), a group that represents 8,000 gun and ammunition manufacturers and dealers:

Industry jobs — 166,200 in 2008 to 287,986 in 2015.

Industry wages — $ 6.4 billion to $ 14.5 billion.

Industry economic impact — $ 19.1 billion to $ 49.3 billion.

“Some people jokingly refer to ( Obama) as the salesman of the year for the industry,” NSSF Senior Vice President Lawrence Keane once said.

The industry’s fear- mongering overshadows Obama’s support for the Second Amendment. “The Second Amendment in this country is part of our Constitution,” he said in 2011, “and the president of the United States is bound by our Constitution. So I believe in the Second Amendment. It does provide for Americans the right to bear arms for their protection, for their safety, for hunting, for a wide range of uses.”

But Obama doesn’t hold an absolutist position on, for example, the right to own military- style weapons. He also scoffs at people who equate better background checks with gun confiscation. He didn’t help his case with his April 2008 remark that when people feel insecure economically, “they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren’t like them.”

Wayne LaPierre, chief of the National Rifle Association, insists that there’s “a massive Obama conspiracy to deceive voters and hide his true intentions to destroy the Second Amendment.”

That hardly seems likely. After the 2012 Sandy Hook school massacre, Obama couldn’t even get the Senate — then controlled by Democrats — to OK expanded background checks. Now he can’t get lawmakers to ban gun purchases by people on no- fly lists.

Obama is leaving, but a new boogeyman — or boogeywoman to be precise — is waiting in the wings, and the gun industry has long had its sights on her. “Hillary Clinton hasn’t met a gun- control bill that she couldn’t support,” LaPierre said last year.

Despite the fact that the Trump Organization doesn’t allow guns on many of its properties, according to an ABC News investigation, GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump says he’s against gun- free zones and would be the best friend the gun industry has ever had.

That could breed complacency, and that’s bad for business. What the gun industry needs is someone like Clinton. Someone it can’t stand.

Paul Brandus, founder and White House bureau chief of West Wing Reports, is the author of Under This Roof: The White House and the Presidency.