National Robbers Association

 

The NRA is in trouble. 🤭

Former NRA CEO, Wayne LaPierre, has been banned from working at the NRA and affiliate organizations for 10 years after being found guilty of financial mismanagement.

In other words, he was stealing money from NRA supporters.

I'm sending Wayne my deepest thoughts and prayers, and I hope that he can continue to afford rent without his side hustle.

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Just this year, we invested $300,000 in Molly Cook's campaign and helped her become the youngest and most progressive member of the Texas State Senate. And just this week, our investment in Oscar De Los Santos’ campaign helped him clinch the primary election by a reassuring margin. (Oscar might just be on track to be the youngest Speaker of a state house in the country 😁)

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 ADDED:

In the N.R.A. Case, Wins and Losses for the Attorney General

Letitia James, the New York attorney general, had sought to dissolve the gun rights group. She succeeded in ousting its head and forcing it to reform.

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By James Barron 

Aug. 6, 2024, 5:02 a.m. ET

Credit...Jefferson Siegel for The New York Times

The leadership of the National Rifle Association was back in a Manhattan courtroom last month for the second phase of a high-stakes trial. In the first phase, in January, Wayne LaPierre, the longtime face of the gun rights movement who had stepped down just before the proceeding began, was found liable for spending $5.4 million of the group’s money.

In the second phase, the stakes are higher. I asked Danny Hakim, who has covered the trial, to explain where things stand.

You called the case so far a split decision. Why?

Each side can claim some wins.

Letitia James, the New York attorney general, had originally sought to dissolve the N.R.A., an idea that was rejected by Justice Joel Cohen of State Supreme Court in Manhattan long before the trial even started. She had also sought to impose an outside monitor to oversee the group’s finances and governance for three years. Justice Cohen also rejected that idea last week.

But James accomplished a great deal. Even some of the N.R.A.’s former insiders thought she was surfacing legitimate corruption problems that needed to be addressed, and she succeeded in winning the ouster of Wayne LaPierre, who had led the N.R.A. for more than three decades. He resigned on the eve of the trial and was then found liable by the trial jury for misspending $5.4 million. The former chief financial officer, Wilson Phillips, was found liable for $2 million.

Her case hobbled the N.R.A., at least in the short term. The group is a shadow of the political powerhouse it was as recently as 2016. Its revenue and membership have also plummeted, and its legal costs have soared.

If there’s no outside monitor, what happens now?

Justice Cohen laid out a series of significant reform measures, the details of which he wants the sides to negotiate.

The kinds of steps he laid out have the potential to loosen the grip of LaPierre allies over the N.R.A. and open up the organization’s governance to more of its members.

Among other things, he told the two sides to discuss how to make it easier for candidates to get onto the group’s 76-member governing board and to explore shrinking the board to a more manageable size. And he wants to overhaul the association’s audit committee, getting rid of members who were around when troublesome conduct was occurring.

A witness during the trial testified there was “a new N.R.A., N.R.A. 2.0.” Is there?

Depends on whom you ask. The attorney general’s office has argued that there’s little evidence to support the idea that the N.R.A. has really changed its stripes much. Their point is that the group only began reforming how it operates under the duress of scrutiny from the media and an investigation.

By contrast, the N.R.A. has countered by pointing to a number of steps it has already taken and saying that outside oversight would be gratuitous.

Justice Cohen seemed to see merit in both arguments, but he expressed doubt that the N.R.A. would “simply lapse back” into problematic practices. He said in court that “it cannot be ignored that the environment surrounding the N.R.A. has changed significantly and, in my view, unalterably” since the case was filed.

He added that a monitor “would result inevitably in a long, awkward and potentially speech-chilling governmental intrusion on the affairs of the organization.”

Ironically, given that James once sought to dismantle the N.R.A., her investigation could lead it to become more cost-conscious, more transparent — and more effective. But it needs to repair relations with its members at a time when other gun groups have gained prominence, so it’s hard to predict to what extent an “N.R.A. 2.0” will rebound.

Where does the new president of the N.R.A.’s board fit into the picture?

In May, the N.R.A. elected new leadership. But the two new top leaders of the organization have very different visions for the organization, according to their trial testimony.

Former Representative Bob Barr of Georgia, the new board president, is a longtime LaPierre ally. He represents the old guard of the organization. The man replacing LaPierre as chief executive, Doug Hamlin, ran the publications division but wants to break from past practices.

Hamlin would like to reclaim control over decisions about litigation strategy. Barr and his predecessor, Charles Cotton, who remains a highly influential figure on the board, prefer to keep the board in charge of legal matters.

Justice Cohen, for his part, didn’t find the testimony of Barr and Cotton fully credible, particularly after it was revealed that they had portrayed the first phase of the trial to other N.R.A. members as a success.

Can LaPierre return to the N.R.A.?

He has been barred from serving as an officer or director for a decade. At 74, he’s not likely to play a major role at the N.R.A. again.

NYT