CIVIL RIGHTS UPDATE: Did Guns Doom Hillary In Michigan? Quite Possibly.

Sure, Sen. Bernie Sanders beat the odds and pulled off a significant primary win against Hillary Clinton in Tuesday’s Michigan primary. But while most pundits credited disaffected white union workers and starry-eyed millennials with the Vermont senator’s win, another issue could have pulled in many of the late deciders who cast their ballot for Sanders.

During Sunday’s Democratic debate, Clinton tried to land some stiff blows against Sanders’ support of Americans’ gun rights and legislation that shields firearms manufacturers from frivolous lawsuits. His defense of the gun industry earned him a nod from the NRA, who applauded his advocacy of Second Amendment rights and citizen access to guns.

But there were others who were likely listening.

What Clinton might not have considered is that Michigan has a long hunting and shooting tradition and has some of the highest rates of hunting license sales and firearm background checks in the country. In 2015, the FBI processed over 500,000 background checks for gun buyers in Michigan, about the same number as in 2014.

And in 2013, the last year of available records according the the National Shooting Sports Foundation, the state sold nearly 800,000 hunting licenses. That means about 10 percent of the population of Michigan over the age of 15 are hunters. It’s not the highest rate in the country, but its well above Ohio, Florida, or even Iowa.

Researchers who look into the issue of concealed carry rights find that as of 2014, nearly half a million Michiganders hold permits to wear a gun. Rough back-of-the-napkin math shows that’s about 5 percent of the adult population of the state over the age of 21, the minimum age for permits.

In fact, there’s solid momentum in the state behind a bill introduced this year that would remove the need to even apply for a concealed carry permit. If it passes, Michigan would join Alaska, Arizona, Arkansas, Kansas, Maine and — wait for it — Vermont as states that do not require a concealed carry permit for its citizens.

And if you look at the exit polls for the March 8 Democratic primary, while Clinton had the urban voters locked up, Sanders crushed Clinton in rural areas and in the southeast, southwest and the hunter-heavy north-central and Upper Peninsula of the state, where he beat the former New York senator by 20 points.

Ouch.