Statement From NRA-ILA Executive Director
Chris W. Cox On H.R. 5175, The "DISCLOSE Act"
I appreciate the concerns that some NRA members have raised regarding our position on H.R. 5175, the "DISCLOSE Act." Regrettably, our position has been misstated by some and intentionally misrepresented by others. I hope you'll allow me to provide the proper context.
The U.S. Supreme Court's Citizens United decision was a significant victory for free speech and the Constitution. The NRA filed a strong brief in that case, which the Court specifically cited several times in its opinion. The DISCLOSE Act is an attempt to reverse that victory and that's why we told Congress we oppose it.
The NRA has never supported -- nor would we ever support -- any version of this bill. Those who suggest otherwise are wrong.
The restrictions in this bill should not apply to anyone or to any organization. My job is to ensure they don't apply to the NRA and our members. Without the NRA, the Second Amendment will be lost and I will do everything in my power to prevent that.
We believe that any restriction on political speech is repugnant. But some of our critics believe we should put the Second Amendment at risk over a First Amendment principle to protect other organizations. That's easy to say -- unless you have a sworn duty to protect the Second Amendment above all else, as I do.
The NRA is a single-issue organization made up of millions of individual members dedicated to protecting the Second Amendment. We do not represent the interests of other organizations. Nor do all groups fight all issues together. For example, we didn't support the U.S. Chamber of Commerce when it backed amnesty for tens of millions of illegal aliens and we did not join the Chamber in its support of President Obama's stimulus bill. And we've been in direct opposition when the Chamber has tried to restrict Second Amendment rights in publicly accessible parking lots.
Rather than focusing on opposing this bill, some have encouraged people to blame the NRA for this Congress's unconstitutional attack on free speech. That's a shame. If you oppose this bill, I hope you will contact your Member of Congress and Senators so they can hear from you.
Statement From David Keene, NRA First
Vice-President On H.R. 5175, The "DISCLOSE Act"
I have been an NRA Board member for some years and currently serve as NRA's First Vice-President -- that you may know. What you may not know is that I have been in the forefront of the fight against liberal attempts to tilt the political playing field their way for decades through what they like to call campaign finance reform. This is a battle that began in the seventies when I put together the case that went to the United States Supreme Court known as Buckley v. Valeo. I was a vocal opponent of the so-called McCain-Feingold "reforms" that shackled groups like the NRA in recent years, and I have served as a First Amendment Fellow at Vanderbilt University's Freedom Forum.
I can assure you that I would never countenance a "deal" of the sort you think the NRA made with Congress to further Democratic attempts to restrict political speech. I consider such restrictions to be not only repugnant, but blatantly unconstitutional, an opinion shared by NRA Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre and Institute for Legislative Action Executive Director Chris Cox.
The so-called "DISCLOSE ACT" is a horrible piece of legislation designed to do exactly what you suggest. It would require advocacy groups to run a regulatory gauntlet designed to make it very difficult for many of them to play the role for which they were formed and is both bad policy and flies in the face of recent Supreme Court decisions.
But I'm afraid there's more … particularly how it would affect the NRA. When you think of the NRA you no doubt think mostly about the NRA's advocacy on Second Amendment issues, but the NRA also provides training to its members, law enforcement and military personnel, works with states, counties and private organizations to build ranges and runs competitive events such as those at Camp Perry in Ohio. Since Camp Perry is a military base, public monies go into range development and federal funds go to training military and police personnel, the NRA would be classed with government contractors and TARP recipients under the DISCLOSE ACT as originally written and effectively prohibited from engaging in any meaningful political activity.
In other words, this act as originally written by anti-gun legislators like New York Senator Chuck Schumer would have silenced the NRA …which would have been the death knell for the Second Amendment.
NRA has one major mission … to defend the right of its members and all Americans to Keep & Bear Arms as guaranteed by the Second Amendment. Therefore, the NRA served notice on Congress that since the act threatened our very existence, we were prepared to do anything and everything that might be required to defeat it unless it was changed so that we could continue to represent the views of our members in the public arena. The letter, sent on May 26, was public. The NRA did not engage in back room shenanigans, but told Congressional leaders quite clearly that we would do whatever we needed to do to protect the rights of our members and our ability to defend the Second Amendment.
Last week Democratic leadership in the House capitulated by agreeing to exempt the NRA from the act -- not in return for NRA support, but to avoid a political war that might cost them even more seats this fall.
I have to tell you that I never thought the Democrats would agree to this -- not because they have much regard for constitutional rights -- because I didn't believe their left wing would allow it. The events since their capitulation convince me that their fear of NRA retaliation forced them to take steps that split their coalition and could easily doom the whole bill.
Consider this: on Thursday night, California Senator Diane Feinstein, one of the most anti-Second Amendment members of the Senate, announced that she wouldn't support the DISCLOSE ACT if it exempted the NRA. By Friday some two-dozen left wing activist groups that had previously been pressing Congress to pass the bill announced that now they wanted it defeated.
The bottom line is that in refusing to risk its members' rights and the very survival of the Second Amendment, the NRA has also made it less rather than more likely that support for this terrible legislation will collapse and the free speech rights of every one of us will benefit.
Setting The Record Straight On The "DISCLOSE Act"
We appreciate the concerns some NRA members have raised about our position on H.R. 5175, the "DISCLOSE Act." Unfortunately, the mainstream media and other critics of NRA's role in this process have misstated or misunderstood the facts. We'd like to set the record straight.
We have never said we would support any version of this bill. To the contrary, we clearly stated NRA's strong opposition to the DISCLOSE Act (as introduced) in a letter sent to Members of Congress on May 26 (click here to read the letter).
Through the courts and in Congress, the NRA has consistently and strongly opposed any effort to restrict the rights of our four million members to speak and have their voices heard on behalf of gun owners nationwide. The initial version of H.R. 5175 would effectively have put a gag order on the NRA during elections and threatened our members' right to privacy and freedom of association, by forcing us to turn our donor lists over to the federal government. We would also have been forced to list our top donors on all election-related television, radio and Internet ads and mailings -- even mailings to our own members. We refuse to let this Congress impose those unconstitutional restrictions on our Association.
The introduced version of the bill would also have prohibited political speech by all federal government contractors. The NRA has contracts to provide critical firearm training for our Armed Forces and law enforcement agencies throughout the country. The bill would have forced us to choose between training our men and women in uniform and exercising our right to free political speech. We refused to let this Congress force us to make that choice.
We told Congress we opposed the bill. Consequently, congressional leaders announced they would exempt us from its draconian restrictions on political speech. If that happens, we will not be involved in final consideration of this bill in the House. If it doesn't, we will strongly oppose the bill.
Our position is based on principle and experience. During consideration of the previous campaign finance legislation passed in 2002, congressional leadership repeatedly refused to exempt the NRA from its provisions, promising that our concerns would be fixed somewhere down the line. That didn't happen; instead, the NRA had to live under those restrictions for seven years and spend millions of dollars on compliance costs and on legal fees to challenge the law. We will not go down that road again when we have an opportunity to protect our ability to speak.
There are those who say the NRA should put the Second Amendment at risk over a First Amendment principle. That's easy to say -- unless you have a sworn duty to protect the Second Amendment above all else, as we do.
The NRA is a non-partisan, single-issue organization made up of millions of individual members dedicated to the protection of the Second Amendment. We do not represent the interests of other organizations. That's their responsibility. Our responsibility is to protect and defend the interests of our members. And that we do without apology.
Today, the fate of the bill remains in doubt. The House floor debate has repeatedly been postponed. Lawmakers and outside groups who once supported the bill, or took no position -- including the Brady Campaign -- have now come out against it because of the announcement regarding NRA. The outcome in the Senate is even murkier, as anti-gun Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) has announced her strong opposition to the proposed change.
No matter what may happen now, NRA members can be assured that protection of gun owners' interests will remain NRA's top priority. Please check in regularly at www.NRAILA.org for the latest news on this issue.
STATE ROUNDUP (Please note the only items listed below are those that have had recent action. For other updates on state legislation, please go to the state legislation section at www.NRAILA.org, and check each week's issue of the Grassroots Alert.)
ARKANSAS: Comments Needed on Management Plan for the Felsenthal and Overflow National Refuges The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has released a plan to guide management of the Felsenthal and Overflow National Wildlife Refuges for the next 15 years. Felsenthal is a 65,000-acre refuge established as a result of a Corps of Engineers' Ouachita and Black Rivers Navigation Project. Overflow is a 13,000-acre refuge that was created to protect one of the remaining bottomland hardwood forests within the watershed of Overflow Creek along the Mississippi waterfowl flyway. Felsenthal offers quota hunts for white tailed deer and turkey, and offers waterfowl, squirrel, rabbit, raccoon, and opossum hunts. Management Alternative B proposes to create additional hunting opportunities for youth and hunters with disabilities where feasible. Overflow offers similar hunt programs and proposes making hunting opportunities more accessible for hunters with disabilities and opening the Oakwood unit to deer hunting. The plan can be viewed at http://southeast.fws.gov/planning under "Draft CCP Documents." The Service is accepting comments until July 7th and comments may be emailed to [email protected]. For further information, you may call 601-965-4903. It is important to the future of hunting on these refuges that hunters comment on this draft plan. You can be assured that anti-hunters and animal rights activists will file comments urging the Service to reduce or eliminate the hunt programs.
CALIFORNIA: Two Anti-Gun Bills Scheduled for Hearings Next Week in Sacramento Assembly Bill 1934 and Assembly Bill 2223 are both scheduled to be considered on Tuesday, June 22. These bills pose a very serious threat to the Second Amendment rights of California's law-abiding gun owners. To learn more about them and how to take action in opposition, please click here.
Long Gun Registration Bill Scheduled for a Hearing on Tuesday, June 29 Assembly Bill 1810 is scheduled to be considered by the Senate Public Safety Committee on Tuesday, June 29. AB1810 would establish a registration system, similar to the one currently in place for handguns, for all newly-acquired long guns. Under AB1810, the make, model and serial number of the firearm as well as the identifying information of the purchaser would be recorded and kept on file by the California Attorney General's office. Please contact the members of the Senate Public Safety Committee TODAY and strongly voice your opposition to AB1810. Contact information can be found here.
COLORADO: Support Needed for Establishing a Shooting Range in the Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest Recently, the U.S. Forest Service closed an area in the Boulder Ranger District of the Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest that was a popular site for target shooting. Known as the former Allenspark dump, the site is located between Boulder and Estes Park and west of Lyons at the junction of Highways 7 and 72. Over the past several years, houses have been built not far from the site, and with the influx of new residents, complaints started about stray bullets leaving Forest land and entering private property. As a result of these complaints, the Service issued an emergency closure of the shooting site. At the same time, it announced a proposal to establish and build a designated shooting range at the same site.
The Service is giving the public until June 24th to comment on its proposal. The proposal can be found at http://www.fs.fed.us/r2/arnf. Click on "Allenspark Recreational Shooting Project." Comments can be emailed to [email protected] and the subject line should read "Allenspark Recreational Shooting Project." For further information you may call the District Ranger's office at 303-541-2500.
Loss of public land access for hunting and shooting is a major concern. Many national forests have closed huge acreages to recreational shooting and your NRA has been working with sportsmen in the state to stem the loss of access. The closure of Allenspark is an all too common epitaph for traditional shooting sites when development and other recreational activities cause conflicts with shooting. In this particular case, the Service is stepping forward to respond to the needs of shooters while addressing concerns raised by nearby residents. It is vitally important that the shooting community rally support around this proposal by submitting comments to the Forest Service. While the NRA fully supports the proposal to build a shooting range, we do not support the Forest Service's requirement that it be a supervised range and that it can only be opened with on-site presence of the supervisor. Most shooting ranges on national forests are unsupervised and such a requirement severely limits the probability that such a range proposal will become reality.
DELAWARE: Right-to-Carry Permit Reform Headed to the Governor On June 9, the Delaware Senate passed House Bill 226 by a vote of 21 to 0. An amendment in the bill would provide an affirmative defense to any person who is charged with carrying a concealed deadly weapon and has filed for a renewal of their permit, but is still waiting for the Superior Court to act. The House passed the bill in 2009 with the NRA-supported amendment by a voice vote, but it was not taken up by the Senate and was only recently revived. The National Rifle Association and Delaware State Sportsmen's Association sought to include this amendment because Delaware's law-abiding permit holders have been delayed by the Court and or the Attorney General's office in renewing their licenses. Please contact Governor Jack Markell (D) and respectfully encourage him to sign HB226. The Governor can be reached by phone at (302) 744-4101 or (302) 577-3210. To send email, please visit http://smu.governor.delaware.gov/cgi-bin/mail.php?contact.
KANSAS: Anti-Carry Proposal Defeated in Topeka! On June 15, the Topeka City Council voted 5 to 3 to continue to allow the legal open carry of firearms in Topeka. This vote once again signifies the city council's desire to protect the city's residents from needless attacks on our basic Second Amendment rights. Thank you to all those who contacted their council member, as well as those 200-plus members who took time out of their busy schedules to attend Tuesday's meeting.
MASSACHUSETTS: House Votes to Send Governor Patrick's Anti-Gun Bill Back to Committee The Massachusetts House voted to send House Bill 4102, Governor Deval Patrick's (D) anti-gun bill, back to the Joint Committee on the Judiciary for consideration. Among other things, House Bill 4102, would limit lawful firearm purchases to one per 30-day period and require the private transfer of all firearms, even those between family and friends, to be conducted through a federally licensed firearms dealer. In essence, this bill is a repeat of Chapter 180 of the Acts of 1998; statutes that created some of the most confusing and ill-advised gun laws in the nation. The vast majority of those new laws attacked lawful gun owners and did little, if anything, to address violent crime in the Commonwealth. The only results have been a startling 85 percent decrease in the number of lawfully licensed gun owners in Massachusetts and a dramatic increase in crime. If enacted, H.4102 would have disastrous effects on the Second Amendment rights of Massachusetts' law-abiding gun owners. Please continue to check www.NRAILA.org and your email for updates.
MISSOURI: Two Important Pro-Gun Bills Awaiting Governor's Consideration House Bill 1692 and House Bill 2081 are currently on the desk of Governor Jay Nixon (D) awaiting his consideration. To learn more about these bills and how you can take action, please click here.
NEW JERSEY: Attack on Your Right to Privacy Held in Committee Thanks to your calls, A2595 sponsored by Assemblywoman Linda Greenstein (D-14), was discussed before the Assembly Judiciary Committee on Tuesday but held without a vote. A2595 is a blatant attempt by entrenched New Jersey Politicians to strong-arm citizens who oppose their re-election. If passed, A2595 would mandate that any "issue advocacy organization" classified under IRS Code as a 501(C) (3), 501 (C) (4) or 527 that engages in the election or defeat of any person to state or local elective office; the passage or defeat of any public question; or that provides political information on any candidate, must submit the names and addresses of contributors and their employers to the Election Law Enforcement Commission. The NRA will continue to watch this bill and work to ensure that our members' privacy and right to participate within the legislative and political process without the threat of retaliation is protected.
NEW YORK: Micro-Stamping Sponsor, State Senator Eric Schneiderman, Seeks "Do-Over" Law-abiding gun owners, fed-up taxpayers and concerned business owners spoke out loud and clear when they urged their State Senators to reject S 6005, a bill that would outlaw semi-automatic handguns not equipped with so-called "micro-stamping technology." S 6005 was brought to the floor on Tuesday and supporters of micro-stamping failed to garner the 32 votes necessary to pass the bill, coming up two short. As they came to the end of the roll call, leaders asked for the bill to be "laid aside," and then later expunged the bi-partisan vote from the record as though it had never taken place. In what can only be viewed as an unethical, childish maneuver, State Senator Eric Schneiderman (D-31) and proponents of S 6005 are working to switch some votes and bring the bill back to the floor for another chance at final passage. Constituents should be outraged if another vote is allowed to take place, as this means that making your voice heard means nothing to the leadership in charge of the State Senate in Albany! Every New York NRA member needs to contact Senator Schneiderman, who in addition to being the sponsor of S 6005, is a candidate for Attorney General of the State of New York. Please politely let him know that if he and his leadership allow a "do-over" on the micro-stamping vote that he should not be trusted as the state's top advocate for your rights. State Senator Eric Schneiderman can be reached at 518-455-2041 and [email protected]. Also be sure to contact your State Senator immediately at 518-455-2800 to urge them to continue to oppose S 6005! To identify your State Senator, please click here or here.
TENNESSEE: Comments Needed on Management Plan for Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has released a plan to guide management of the Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge for the next 15 years. The 51,000 acre Refuge is comprised of three separate units that run along 65 miles of the Tennessee River in Henry, Benton, Decatur, and Humphreys Counties. The Refuge offers limited hunting for deer, turkey, squirrel, raccoon, and resident Canada geese. The three management alternatives presented in the plan would continue to provide for hunting, in varying degrees. Alternative B, which has a public use emphasis, would increase hunting for deer and would consider new types of hunts. The plan can be viewed at http:southeast.fws.gov/planning under "Draft CCP Documents." Scroll down to Tennessee. The Service is accepting public comments until July 7th and comments may be emailed to [email protected]. For further information you may call 731-432-0981. It is important to the future of hunting in the Refuge that hunters comment on this draft plan. You can be assured that anti-hunters and animal rights activists will file comments urging the Service to reduce or eliminate hunting in the Tennessee National Wildlife Refuge.
VIRGINIA: Please join your fellow Virginia freedom-lovers at "An American Event", to be held Saturday, July 3, 2010, from 2:00--9:00 p.m., at Ritchie Lake Pavilion in Bealeton. Gates open at 1:00 p.m., with the main event commencing at 7:00 p.m. The event will include activities for all age groups, including Colonial and World War II military encampments, air show, pony rides, moon bounce, monster trucks, live music, surprise speakers and more. If you are interested in donating time or energy, please contact the organizers at 703-537-5444 or [email protected]. Monetary donations will be given to the Salvation Army and Wounded Warriers. For more information, please visit www.AnAmericanEvent.org.
WASHINGTON: Volunteers Needed on July 10 in the Snoqualmie National Forest The U.S. Forest Service is asking for volunteers to assist in a clean-up of garbage and debris left at several shooting sites located in the GREENWATER AREA on the Snoqualmie Ranger District of the Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest. The areas are becoming filled with a variety of trash, household items, and shooting debris. In order to keep access opened, the areas need to be cleaned and maintained. The Service does not have sufficient staff to do this on its own and is asking for help. Please consider donating some time to this effort. It is one of the major ways that keeps Federal lands open to the public for informal target shooting. You are asked to bring trash bags and gloves. If you can join in this volunteer effort and/or have questions, please contact Officer Ian Canaan at 206-510-6496 or email him at [email protected].
WEST VIRGINIA: Comments Needed on Management Plan for Canaan Valley National Refuge The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service has released a plan to guide management of the Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge for the next 15 years. The 16,000 acre Refuge is located in a high elevation valley in Tucker County and includes the largest wetland complex in the state. The Refuge offers hunting, but the new plan would open more hunter access into the interior of the Refuge and open more land to rifle hunting. All three management alternatives described in the plan would enhance hunting opportunities. The plan can be viewed at http://www.fws.gov/northeast/planning. Click on "Refuge CCP's" and scroll down to Canaan. The Service is accepting public comments until July 16th and comments can be emailed to [email protected]. Please put "Canaan Valley NWR CCP" in the subject line. For further information, you may call 304-866-3858. It is important to the future of hunting in Canaan that hunters comment on this draft plan. You can be assured that anti-hunters and animal rights activists will file comments urging the Service to reduce or eliminate hunting in Canaan.
