When Surgeon General Vivek Murthy declared so-called gun violence a “public health emergency” so close to a debate, I figured he was trying to set the stage for President Joe Biden to swoop in and make a stand on an issue Democrats really seem to think they can win on.

Then, it didn’t happen.

Truth be told, there was a lot going on with the debate, with a lot of Democrats now looking to pressure the president to withdraw from the race and have the convention pick a new candidate–and that would probably be wise–but there wasn’t any real discussion of gun control.

Yep. I got that one wrong.

So why didn’t it? I mean, the stage was actually set for Biden. While we might not have understood what he was trying to say–“We beat Medicare!”–but it was a golden opportunity for Democrats.

Mark Chesnut over at The Truth About Guns has a theory.

Call me cynical, but I believe that was by design. CNN, which hosted the debate, is a media standard bearer for all things gun control. In fact, the network hasn’t seen a restrictive gun proposal that it hasn’t embraced. And both Biden and Trump have spoken out often on the matter, just like they have on other issues, leaving little doubt where they stand on the right to bear arms.

So why weren’t there any questions asked on this issue that is so important to many American citizens? I believe it was because CNN and others in the gun-ban community know they are on the wrong side of the issue. And with Biden’s diminished mental capacity, the network and whoever helped it choose questions for the debate simply were afraid of what ignorant things the president might say about firearms.

Perhaps they thought he might spout off one of the standard soundbites he has used multiple times in the past. Phrases like, “Deer don’t wear Kevlar vests,” (duh!) and, “Nobody could own a cannon during the Civil War period,” (an outright lie) don’t engender a lot of trust in a leader. And such answers would likely have drawn a quick—and probably humorous—response from Trump.

Perhaps CNN was worried he would say something about “military-grade assault weapons” when talking about common semi-automatic rifles, or even that the firearm industry is the “only industry in America that has immunity”—both well-debunked falsehoods. Or maybe they thought he’d revert to the old chestnuts that you don’t need: “20, 30, 40, 50 clips in a weapon”, “magazines that can hold multiple bullets in them” or a “magazine with 100 clips in it.”

He brings up an excellent point. CNN is notoriously anti-gun, which should suggest that they would have made that a key issue, but they’ve got ties to the White House. I have no doubt that they also know that every time he says something like that, we start making him look stupid. Even the more left-leaning fact-checkers are starting to have to call him out over how you supposedly couldn’t own a cannon at the time of the nation’s founding even though private parties could own freaking warships.

As a result, I wouldn’t be surprised if someone at CNN honestly figured they were shielding Biden. 

When the media can pick and choose what to include from interviews, they can shield him pretty easily by filtering out the dumbest takes, at least in theory and assuming they recognize them as dumb takes.

In a debate on live TV, they can’t, which we all saw either live or thanks to our favorite websites posting examples for all to see. I don’t think anyone except it to be that bad, admittedly, but leaving the gun discussion out because they wanted to make Biden look a bit better is certainly plausible, to say the least.

The problem with this theory is that it would assume that CNN would realize Biden’s takes on this are weapons-grade stupid. I’m not sure anyone there really does.

Still, it’s something to consider, and it’s also likely why it’s so important for Democrats to keep the debates on friendly ground. They clearly figure Biden needs every advantage he can get, and talking guns sure as heck ain’t it.