Lewiston survivors consider looming election as gun control comes to forefront after mass shooting

LEWISTON, Maine (AP) — Ben Dyer hasn’t decided how he’ll vote in one of the nation’s most closely watched congressional elections this year, but he knows guns will be on his mind when he casts his ballot. And he’s pretty sure he won’t be the only one.

Dyer, a 47-year-old father of two, was shot five times at Schemengees Bar & Grille in Lewiston last October during the deadliest mass shooting in Maine history. He was rushed to a hospital in a game warden’s pickup truck. He still can’t use his right arm.

In the aftermath of a blood-soaked tragedy in which 18 people were killed and many more were wounded at two separate crime scenes, Dyer has watched his state enact a battery of new gun control laws. It is against that backdrop that he and other voters in Maine’s 2nd Congressional District will consider the political future of three-term Congressman Jared Golden.

Golden, a Democrat with a history of supporting gun rights in ways that bucked his party’s orthodoxy, has shifted his position since the Lewiston shooting. A former Marine who served in two wars overseas, he now supports an assault weapons ban. He’s unopposed in Tuesday’s Democratic primary in Maine, but the two Republicans vying to run against him in November have both vowed to defend 2nd Amendment rights more vigorously than he has.

<bsp-list-loadmore data-module="" class=«PageListStandardB» data-gtm-region=«RELATED COVERAGE» data-gtm-topic=«No Value» data-show-loadmore=«true» data-gtm-modulestyle=«List B»> <bsp-custom-headline custom-headline=«div»> RELATED COVERAGE </bsp-custom-headline> <bsp-custom-headline custom-headline=«div»> AP Decision Notes: What to expect in Maine’s state primaries </bsp-custom-headline> <bsp-custom-headline custom-headline=«div»>