NRA Lawsuit

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bblhd672
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Bitter Clinger wrote: Fri Mar 24, 2023 7:00 am NRA: Meet The New Cover, Up Same As The Old Cover Up

https://www.ammoland.com/2023/03/nra-me ... -cover-up/

"Just as Wayne LaPierre, at 73 years old, could not risk retiring and allowing anyone else to have full access to the Association’s books and records, Charles Cotton can’t risk leaving the damage control and cover-up of the failures of the Audit Committee to anyone else either. Even though Cotton has been President for the past two years, he has retained his seat as Chairman of the Audit Committee."
Is it too harsh to want these three to share Jeffrey Epstein's last cell?
Cotton and Coy have been among Wayne LaPierre’s staunchest defenders during the current troubles. Coincidentally, both Cotton and Coy have been Chair and Vice Chair of the Audit Committee for the past 20+ years. When it comes to culpability for the current mess within the NRA, no NRA Directors bear more responsibility for the failures of the Board to detect and correct the glaring problems than do President Cotton and Second Vice President Coy.

Both have admitted in sworn testimony that as Chair and Vice Chair of the Audit Committee, they instructed outside auditors not to explore the books of the Executive Vice President’s office.
KBCraig
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We all remember Cotton proudly announcing that the Audit Committee had found no wrongdoing or financial impropriety.

Could it be because they never even looked?

https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... ss-report/
What do I miss about Texas? Most of the food, some of the people, absolutely none of the weather.
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bblhd672
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Another damning expert witness report:
https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... ss-report/

There's too much in the report to post, below is the last two paragraphs. Everything above these two is worse.
“Between 2014 through 2020, there were approximately $420,000 in restaurant expenses by NRA Personnel where individual charges were over $500 each. For example, in the two years 2019 through 2020, there were $18,000 in expenses charged to Ms. Meadows’s NRA-issued Card consisting of 8 transactions at various steakhouses – an average of over $2,000 per visit. In just three days, January 24 to 26, 2018, over $30,000 was charged to Christopher Sprang’s NRA credit card at the restaurant AquaKnox, a high-end seafood restaurant in Las Vegas. Over a five-year period 2014 – 2018, over $60,000 was charged to Mr. Phillips’s NRA-issued Card at Margaritaville in Nashville, at an average cost of $4,000 per visit.”

We are staggered, I can’t put it in other words. Millions of members kicking in their $45 per year, and these people are blowing it all on limos, first class tickets, thousand-dollar dinners, international hunting trips, and golf fees.
Mike s
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bblhd672 wrote: Tue Mar 28, 2023 10:09 am Another damning expert witness report:
https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... ss-report/

There's too much in the report to post, below is the last two paragraphs. Everything above these two is worse.
“Between 2014 through 2020, there were approximately $420,000 in restaurant expenses by NRA Personnel where individual charges were over $500 each. For example, in the two years 2019 through 2020, there were $18,000 in expenses charged to Ms. Meadows’s NRA-issued Card consisting of 8 transactions at various steakhouses – an average of over $2,000 per visit. In just three days, January 24 to 26, 2018, over $30,000 was charged to Christopher Sprang’s NRA credit card at the restaurant AquaKnox, a high-end seafood restaurant in Las Vegas. Over a five-year period 2014 – 2018, over $60,000 was charged to Mr. Phillips’s NRA-issued Card at Margaritaville in Nashville, at an average cost of $4,000 per visit.”

We are staggered, I can’t put it in other words. Millions of members kicking in their $45 per year, and these people are blowing it all on limos, first class tickets, thousand-dollar dinners, international hunting trips, and golf fees.
I am by no means excusing or discounting any of these huge expenses, however I am curious as to why there's no context included in the linked article.

For example, I'm just a layperson, but even I understand that the SHOT SHOW is an annual event held in Las Vegas in January of each year. The 2018 dates for SHOT SHOW were 23-26 January 2018, which coincides with the dates listed in the article. I'm not happy that the NRA spent $30k at a high-end restaurant, but it is the norm for large national organizations & companies to host big gatherings in the evenings during Shot Show. This is a networking function, which builds or strengthens alliances.

Would I rather those funds had been spent by the NRA Foundation to give grants to community -based non-profits focused on the shooting sports, or by the NRA's Education program to modernize their instructional materials, or by the NRA-ILA's lobbying efforts to prevent further erosion of our rights/regaining rights ceded to regulation? Absolutely!

However, if these funds were allocated to an event for building industry support, and in the end this $30k enabled the NRA to pull in funds from the industry that netted more than $30k to benefit the other programs, then I would see it as a worthwhile expense. Or, if it was a $30k expense that furthered the core mission of the NRA.

However, this article only lays out "what" was spent without context as to "why" or "how it was in furtherance of the NRAs mission", or conversely "how it was a boondoggle/ embezzlement of funds". It only provides enough info for us to draw our own conclusion, & for me I have an innate distrust of anything that smells of slanted reporting. ((The best propaganda / influence operations give the target audience just enough hand-picked info to draw their own conclusions, for whatever desired effect/influence is desired)). I haven't liked LaPierre/ Cox for some time, and any organization that gets too big for it's britches is prime for corruption. However, I have to separate my "feelings" from actual analysis of the facts.
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bblhd672
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Living Well Off Member Dues
https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... mber-dues/
From pdf page 737 of this exhibit (https://iapps.courts.state.ny.us/nyscef ... XPdaVbIw==) in the NY case, we get expenses charged by Tyler Schropp, head of NRA Advancement. This is part of the first page of a 13 page list.

Image

$1,900 one-way airline tickets, $400-900 a night hotel rooms at a golf resort, $287 at the Davidoff of Geneva cigar bar, $172 for a one-day car rental, $4,500 for three nights at a Beverly Hills hotel. Those three nights consumed about 100 annual members’ dues; each airline ticket consumed about 40. The image above covers less than two months in 2016.
FrogFan
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However, this article only lays out "what" was spent without context as to "why" or "how it was in furtherance of the NRAs mission", or conversely "how it was a boondoggle/ embezzlement of funds". It only provides enough info for us to draw our own conclusion, & for me I have an innate distrust of anything that smells of slanted reporting.
I agree with your general distrust of the media and slanted reporting, but I'm wondering in this case if any information available to the membership explains the "why" or the "how" so that it can be reported and the expense can be justified.

When I was working and incurring business expenses, it was up to me to explain the expenses and justify them to my boss, so that they could be approved and I could be reimbursed. It seems to me that NRA leadership ought to be proactive in providing this context. Failing that, we are left to our own devices to surmise the "why" and "how".
KBCraig
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The board was told, on the record, that the settlement was confidential, even directors were’t allowed to know its terms, and like a herd of sheep they accepted that. Off the record, hints were dropped that Ackerman paid the NRA. No, that wasn’t the case. NRA paid through the nose, and the confidentiality clause was meant to conceal this from the board.

https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... to-settle/
What do I miss about Texas? Most of the food, some of the people, absolutely none of the weather.
KBCraig
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More kickback and graft. Lend your yacht to Wayne? Get $110 million in contracts!

https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... r-vendors/
What do I miss about Texas? Most of the food, some of the people, absolutely none of the weather.
KBCraig
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The "celebrity directors" who don't attend, don't vote, and don't exercise any oversight are in for a rude awakening.

https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... insurance/
What do I miss about Texas? Most of the food, some of the people, absolutely none of the weather.
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bblhd672
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DC Suit Against NRA Foundation
https://nraindanger.wordpress.com/2023/ ... oundation/

The hits keep on coming...
NRA Foundation is a DC corporation, and the DC Attorney General has challenged its actions in deciding to lend several million to NRA itself. The argument is that most of the Foundation’s directors are also NRA directors, and so have a conflict of interest when the two entities have dealings. As NRA directors, they must look to the good of NRA, and it desperately needs loans. As Foundation directors, they must look to the good of the Foundation, and only lend money if it’s the best investment opportunity. Handing an unsecured loan to a corporation on the edge of insolvency is not that.
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