NY AG Has NRA in the Crosshairs

New York Attorney General Letitia James, alleging years of fraud and corruption by National Rifle Association executives, filed a lawsuit Thursday seeking to dissolve the NRA. Attorney General James has jurisdiction since the purportedly nonprofit NRA was chartered in New York State in 1871. The suit outlines decades of self-dealing, questionable contracts to family and friends of NRA leaders, payoffs, luxury executive perks, lavish compensation, and tens of millions in financial misconduct. Since the allegations involve tax fraud, the state is sharing its information with the IRS. Bewhiskered General Ambrose Burnside, first NRA President, is no doubt rolling around in his grave.

The DC Attorney General, claiming that the NRA raided its own NRA Foundation to stem the losses of the NRA proper, filed a second lawsuit against the gun group.

More:

“New York Attorney General Sues N.R.A. and Seeks Its Closure,” Danny Hakim, New York Times

“New York AG sues to dissolve the NRA, alleging widespread fraud,” Betsy Woodruff Swan, Max Cohen, and Michelle Bocanegra, Politico

“Wayne LaPierre allegedly used NRA as a ‘personal piggy bank,’ N.Y. AG says,” Erik Ortiz, NBC News

NRA speaks 7 Days After Florida School Shooting

The National Rifle Association has been silent on Twitter since the Parkland school shooting, but NRA VP Wayne LaPierre is listed as a speaker at this week’s Comic-Con for Conservatives, the 2018 Conservative Political Action Conference. CPAC is being held at the Gaylord Convention Center at National Harbor, near DC but closer to a casino. While Mr. LaPierre is a staunch foe of gun-free zones, the Gaylord is one.

Wayne LaPierre isn’t on the CPAC agenda, but since the NRA is CPAC’s biggest sponsor and the biggest donor to GOP campaigns, he’s certain to deliver his usual demagoguery. There’s a half-hour slot on Thursday’s agenda at 10 AM marked “Special Programming,” so that’s our bet. Mike Pence will bless the gathered wingnuts afterwards, at 10:30.

The rest of the 2018 CPAC is a cavalcade of conservative celebs, not just The Apprentice‘s Donald Trump, but disgraced former Sheriff David A. Clarke Jr., talk radio ranters Dana Loesch and Mark Levin, Fox flakes Sean Hannity, Jeanine Pirro, and Sebastian Gorka, and that guy from Pawn Stars.

But CPAC 2018 is not all “America First.” France’s holocaust denier and National Front pin-up person Mademoiselle Marion Maréchal-Le Pen and the UK Independence Party spokesmodel, and Brexiteer Nigel Farage will add European élan to the conservative conclave.

More:

“Less Intellectual and More Salacious”: Commercialized, Trumpified, CPAC Is Adrift.” Tina Nguyen, Vanity Fair

Related:

“Five types of gun laws the Founding Fathers loved,” Saul Cornell, The Conversation

“The NRA’s step-by-step playbook for responding to a mass shooting,” Heather Timmons, Quartz

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The NRA Schoolhouse

The National Rifle Association has come up with a dubious remedy for school shootings: more guns. NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre wants the government to put an armed guard in every school in the country.  The organization that gutted gun regulation and helped flood America with firearms now wants to sell more guns to solve the problem it created, putting schoolkids in the crossfire.