Tag: NRA

The NRA just had a major legal setback. But its hold on the gun-control debate endures.

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It’s been a rough spring for the National Rifle Association.

Last week, a federal judge in Dallas rejected the gun rights organization’s effort to declare bankruptcy, calling it an attempt to avoid legal scrutiny and citing “lingering issues of secrecy and a lack of transparency” some of which he described as “nothing less than shocking.”

The bankruptcy hearing revealed details of lavish perks enjoyed by NRA chief Wayne LaPierre, who received charter flights for trips to the Bahamas with his family, use of luxury yachts and $275,000 worth of suits from the Ermenegildo Zegna boutique in Beverly Hills. New York Attorney General Letitia James has vowed to renew her efforts to dissolve the NRA altogether, saying the organization is riddled with fraud and self dealing. Continue reading.

U.S. trustee opposes NRA bankruptcy petition in blow to gun rights group

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A U.S. bankruptcy administrator asked a federal judge Monday to dismiss the National Rifle Association’s efforts to declare bankruptcy or appoint a trustee or examiner to oversee the gun rights organization — a setback for the group at the close of a federal court hearing to consider its petition.

The recommendation bolstered the arguments of New York Attorney General Letitia James (D), whose office has fought the NRA’s attempts to relocate from New York to Texas, and came after senior NRA executives acknowledged in court testimony that they received lavish perks.

Lisa Lambert, a lawyer with the U.S. trustee’s office, which participates in bankruptcy cases to protect taxpayer interests and enforce bankruptcy laws, told the court that the evidence presented in the hearing showed that the group lacked proper oversight and that personal expenses were masked as business costs. Continue reading.

N.R.A. Chief Takes the Stand, With Cracks in His Armor

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Wayne LaPierre has led the National Rifle Association for 30 years, but his implacable image looked threadbare in bankruptcy court.

the gun lobby, a scourge of the left who argued that giving ground on gun control was akin to giving up on America. So it was remarkable to see the shambolic turn his tenure atop the National Rifle Association has taken showcased last week in federal bankruptcy court in Dallas.

Mr. LaPierre acknowledged that he had secretly taken the N.R.A. into bankruptcy — without telling even his top lieutenants or most of his board — essentially as an end run around attacks from the New York attorney general, who is seeking to shut down the group amid charges of financial mismanagement and corruption. And he made a string of admissions that served largely to underscore the N.R.A.’s disarray and the questions about his own fitness to lead it.

He didn’t know, he testified, that his former chief financial officer had received a $360,000-a-year consulting contract after leaving under a cloud. Continue reading.

NRA reports alleged misspending by current and former executives to IRS

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After years of denying allegations of lax financial oversight, the National Rifle Association has made a stunning declaration in a new tax filing: Current and former executives used the nonprofit group’s money for personal benefit and enrichment.

The NRA said in the filing that it continues to review the alleged abuse of funds, as the tax-exempt organization curtails services and runs up multimillion-dollar legal bills. The assertion of impropriety comes four months after the attorney general of New York state filed a lawsuit accusing NRA chief executive Wayne LaPierre and other top executives of using NRA funds for decades to provide inflated salaries and expense accounts.

The tax return, which The Washington Post obtained from the organization, says the NRA “became aware during 2019 of a significant diversion of its assets.” The 2019 filing states that LaPierre and five former executives received “excess benefits,” a term the IRS uses to describe executives’ enriching themselves at the expense of a nonprofit entity. Continue reading.

GOP Defends NRA Despite Evidence Of Waste, Fraud, And Abuse

Republican lawmakers are calling a lawsuit brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James on Thursday against the National Rifle Association an attack on gun ownership while ignoring the charges of “fraud and abuse” contained in the filing.

House Minority Whip Steve Scalise tweeted in response to the suit: “Violent crime is skyrocketing in NYC. What’s New York’s Democrat Attorney General focused on? Launching politically motivated attacks against the Second Amendment & NRA. Make no mistake: Making it harder for law-abiding Americans to defend themselves is the far-left’s agenda.”

James’ suit seeks to dissolve the organization and ban its officers from serving on nonprofit boards in the future. Continue reading.

New York attorney general sues to dissolve the NRA

The Hill logoNew York Attorney General Letitia James (D) on Thursday announced a lawsuit that seeks to dissolve the National Rifle Association (NRA), alleging the powerful pro-gun interest group violated corporate laws resulting in a loss of more than $64 million over three years.

The 169-page civil suit follows an 18-month fraud investigation by James’s office. The lawsuit alleges that the NRA and four of its top officials diverted millions of dollars away from its charitable mission and instituted “a culture of self-dealing, mismanagement and negligent oversight.”

“As today’s complaints lays out, we found that the NRA … fostered a culture of noncompliance and disregard for internal controls that led to the waste and loss of millions of assets and contributed to the NRA’s current deteriorated financial state,” James said during a press conference. Continue reading.

NRA acted as ‘foreign asset’ for Russia ahead of 2016 election: Senate report

AlterNet logoThe National Rifle Association acted as a “foreign asset” for Russia leading up to the 2016 election, according to a report by Democrats on the Senate Finance Committee.An 18-month investigation into the NRA’s Russia ties by the committee’s minority staff, which reviewed more than 4,000 pages of NRA records, found that NRA leaders promised Russians access to U.S. officials in exchange for Russian business.

The probe found that NRA officials used the organization’s financial resources, which largely come from member dues, to curry favor with Aleksander Torshin, who was then an official at Russia’s Central Bank, and his deputy, convicted Russian spy Maria Butina.

The investigation found that former NRA president David Keene organized a trip to Russia — despite NRA denials that the trip was officially endorsed by the group — during which Butina and Torshin brought a delegation of NRA officials to Moscow. Keene set up the trip on the promise of business opportunities in Russia, including possible deals with a Russian gun manufacturer that was under U.S. sanctions, according to the report.

View the complete September 28 article by Igor Derysh from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

There is no ‘good guy with a gun’: Inside the gun lobby’s most pernicious myth

AlterNet logoWe don’t have more automobiles than people in the United States of America. We don’t have more televisions than people. We don’t have more radios than people. We don’t have more cell phones than people.

What we do have is more guns than people.

A recent report published by the Small Arms Survey in Geneva, Switzerland, found that there are more than 393 million firearms owned by civilians in this country. We have a population of 326 million. That means there are 120.5 firearms for every 100 American citizens, according to the Washington Post. It’s a fact. If every single person in the United States possessed a gun, including babies, elderly people and the infirm — even including those hospitalized and on their deathbeds — there would still be 67 million guns left over.  Sixty-seven million. 

View the complete September 8 post by Lucian K. Truscott IV from Salon on the AlterNet website here.

NRA board member and former president Marion Hammer obtained low-interest loan from affiliate she leads

Washington Post logoA past president of the National Rifle Association has taken out loans totaling more than $250,000, at an interest rate as low as 2 percent, from the NRA’s Florida affiliate, a nonprofit that she has led for decades and that employs only her, according to the organization’s tax filings.

Marion Hammer, executive director of the Unified Sportsmen of Florida, which receives most of its budget from the NRA, took out the loans to refinance or purchase homes, according to the tax filings. Since 1995, when Hammer began borrowing money, she has bought or helped buy several properties in Tallahassee — including one where a daughter resides and another where a granddaughter resides, property and other records show.

The disclosure of the below-market interest rate granted to Hammer, an NRA board member who is one of the nation’s leading gun lobbyists, comes as the organization is being battered by reports of economic benefits flowing to its top leadership. Those reports have fueled internal warfare at the nation’s most powerful gun lobby as well as investigations by the Democratic attorneys general of the District and New York.

View the complete September 6 article by Beth Reinhard and Tom Hamburger on The Washington Post website here.

‘Be honest about this’: Democratic senator shoots down reporter who suggests ‘both parties’ are to blame for mass shootings

AlterNet logoSen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) shot down a question from a reporter on Wednesday that suggested Democrats and Republican carry equal blame for the failure of Congress to address mass shooting in the United States.

“Don’t both parties take blame in the inability to find a solution to these mass shootings?” the reporter asked.

“No, no,” Brown responded while addressing the press in Dayton, Ohio, the site of just one of the weekend’s mass shootings.

View the complete August 7 article by Cody Fenwick on the AlterNet website here.