I’ll update as more info comes in. Word is that the anti-reformers asked to go into executive session. The reformers had planned to oppose this, were willing to take their position in front of everyone’s eyes. They knew that it would be a test, a VERY big thing. There are lots of directors, maybe a majority, who just went to keep their seats, which means to vote for whichever side eventually wins. A test vote lets them judge who that will be, and when they shift, a bare majority can become an overwhelming one.
The vote to go into exec session FAILED, the good guys won, and by 33-27. 16 either are not attending or did not vote. That’s a pretty good margin for the reformers! Especially on a motion where the board is so accustomed to reflexively voting “yes.” (At the last board meeting they went into executive session in the middle of the officers’ opening speeches, and came out when they adjourned).
Vote for president: Barr wins, 37-30.
1st VP: Bill Bachenberg (hurrah!)
2nd VP: Mark Vaughn, another reformer.
EVP: a surprise, Doug Hamlin, currently head of NRA Publications.
NRA in Danger 
Congratulations to the reformers for taking charge! One step at a time is a good course of action and eventually we will prevail in replacing the inept board.
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Sadly, things did not turn out well. Journalist Stephen Gutowski is there and reported this on X thirty minutes ago:
“Bob Barr has won the election to be NRA president. He got 37 votes. Buz Mills got 30.”
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Seems we need to get even more reformers and competent individuals elected to the board every year.
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Without meaningful reforms, being president may be a short term hollow victory for Barr. With the finances in a free fall he may have no choice but bankruptcy which by default will be the biggest unelected member of the NRA staff.
Evidently the status quo types want to ride what’s left into the ground. Perhaps someone in open session should ask them what percentage of nothing they and Brewer are seeking.
The NRA is a living breathing Abilene Paradox.
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A big thank you members of the BOD who courageously voted down going into executive session (We do not want you to oversee what we are doing with your—oops!—our money.)
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Well, Gutowski’s reporting that Bachenberg got 1st VP. That’s some good news.
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And just now that Vaughn took 2nd VP. Both these votes were 35 to 31.
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Sorry, 1st VP vote was 36-31, the 2nd VP vote was 35-31. Curious.
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What exactly are these positions and how does the hierarchy work? I never paid much attention before now but always thought the President was mostly ceremonial and that WLP was the EVP, so assumed that was the top paid position.
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President runs the board 1st VP and 2nd VP are officers – at least now there will be debate on strategy not just doing what BRewer says
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Thanks, that sounds promising. More so than I expected out of day 1 with only a few BOD truly campaigning on a reform platform.
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On that pamphlet, the reform candidates for Pres., 1VP, & 2VP were listed, but nobody for the all-important EVP. Is Doug Hamlin’s nomination just the least bad option they think they could nominate at this point, or is there some alignment with the reform agenda on Hamlin’s part?
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‘Cuz he just won..
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Doug is the worst possible choice!
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Doug is an interim. Plan is Get a proper CEO search committee and hire a long term replacement.
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Hamlin is not the worst possible choice. The status quo’s top choice would be the worst. Hamlin at least has real world business experience with Petersen Pubs. That makes him a better choice than the inside the Beltway swamp creatures whose entire careers are based on glad-handing and influence peddling. He is not perfect, but he is not the worst. Especially if he is temporary.
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Cut the “nads” from under Brewer as fast as Superman’s legs while carry him. Find the cheapest ambulance chaser possible and it’ll be better legal advice that any from Brewer.
Endowment Life Member and five year plus non-contributor
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How has this not been brought to light??? Asking for a friend.
NOTE: There has been a serious bar complaint filed against John Frazer. The man is at risk of being disbarred. This information (about the bar complaint) is not generally known to board members who will be voting on Monday.
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Not yet verified, so I hesitate posting this: However, four minutes ago I got this message:
“”Just heard that Doug Hamlin won.”
NOTE: NOT verified yet, but it’s from a pretty good source, who got the info from someone else. I will not stand behind this yet.
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Gutowski reported this as well, so am very hopeful that it’s true.
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Update: Verified. Hamlin is in.
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Doug Hamlin appears to be honest, and untainted by scandal.
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Not really. He commuted from California weekly for many years. He got his position for securing the Peterson firearms.
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GFYS: I thought Tony Makris secured Petersen’s guns for the museum.
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Doug worked for Peterson
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GFYS, right, but how does that translate into having a say over his old boss’s estate? The Petersen gallery at the museum opened in 2010. Hamlin started working at the NRA in 2014. That timeline seems off for a quid pro quo.
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It’s time to fight fire with fire. All these confidential sources need to come public. Testify in court. Do interviews in pro gun media. Spread the word. Go on record. Enough of the “I heard from a reliable source”, that won’t win the brand loyalists over to our side. Those reliable source employees or whomever need to stand up and be counted… Or get lost.
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nolson1404: Note that you write behind a screen name such that people don’t know who you are. Think of the Federalist Papers. Sometimes people are not able to openly ID in public.
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I don’t work for the NRA, never have. I’m regretfully a life member from years ago. I have no inside knowledge to share. Are you suggesting that this house of cards which is the current NRA is a physical danger to any employees? Are you suggesting an employee with knowledge of wrong doing would be murdered for speaking out by the NRA leadership? Are you suggesting they’ll have a gun to their head? Given an offer they can’t refuse? Or their families threatened? Are you suggesting Charles Cotton or Bill Brewer would pull a Clinton or Boeing and people start having strange accidents or sudden cases of suicide?
If that’s not the case, then, yes, they can come public, and speak on the record. Your analogy to the Federalist Papers, and a new and fledgling republic being formed, where there was a potential of violence, I don’t see how that’s relevant to the matter at hand.
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I am at the BoD Meeting and can confirm what has been reported so far. Currently they are in Executive session to answer a legal question that was posed. When it goes back to normal, it will be the vote for Secretary.
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I know most people won’t want to hear this, but organizational change and development takes a long time. The immediate concern has to be establishing governance, accountability, and transparency. And I’m sure searching for new outside counsel.
I’m very happy with the results so far and am more hopeful for the organization than I’ve been in a long time. Still some huge obstacles and power dynamics to grapple with, though. The goal is to rebuild, not burn it down from the inside out of spite for past wrongs and remaining sinners.
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100%!
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The immediate concern may be more immediate than that. Someone in-the-know shared this:
“NRA is almost bankrupt and will be out of money in a few weeks. Big layoffs are coming because they won’t be able to meet payroll.”
My hope is that person was exaggerating or perhaps not as much in-the-know as I had thought.
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NRA-ILA reports: “The Board of Directors also re-elected Sonya B. Rowling as NRA Treasurer and John C. Frazer as NRA Secretary. This year, the NRA membership voted overwhelmingly to create the position of NRA Chief Compliance Officer. Robert Mensinger was elected by the Board to serve in that position.“
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John Frazer and Robert Mensinger are not win. Rowling should be gone.
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John Richardson at onlygunsandmoney has this regarding John Frazer and Sonya Rowling:
Regarding Frazer, “In no other non-profit or corporation would the General Counsel still have the job after a jury found him guilty of violating his fiduciary duties and submitting false filings to a governmental agency. Rowling is, like Frazer, someone who in the end will do what they are told. Witness the cutting of a check to Brewer’s law firm this weekend even though it devastates the NRA’s finances.”
https://onlygunsandmoney.com/2024/05/20/ronnie-barrett-for-evp.html
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In reply to Nobody Special. That Doug was a part of the firearms donation was what was said when he was named the Director of Publications. He might not be the perfect choice is fair. One can only hope he does the right thing. His past actions have shown that he was willing to go along with the corruption (commuting from California weekly for years on NRA’s dime, I believe his local abode was also paid for by NRA) until it was brought to light. It’s my understanding that he made some sort of restitution after that. His heart may fundamentally be in the right place but I don’t particularly care for him. Just my gut feeling.
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Something else to consider: Recall that supposed member-resolution to support the move to Texas? (“Supposed” because it was written by David Coy, board member and at the time 2nd VP, and then presented by two members.) Recall that the members at the members meeting resoundingly beat down that resolution. Did you think that meant that the move to Texas was off-the-table?
That is not what the powers-that-be are telling people. The powers had not even left the hotel in Dallas when they already were making clear to those who ask, “NO, that vote does NOT mean that the NRA won’t be moving to Texas. Nothing binding about it.”
What Jeff Knox, Rocky Marshall, Phil Journey, and Dennis Fusaro achieved is amazing. Yet, when the party’s over and the sobering up begins, members are left with the reality that the move to Texas is not off the table, and the members are left with, as John Richardson said, a general counsel found guilty of violating his fiduciary duties and submitting false filings to a governmental agency and a treasurer who would cut a check to Brewer’s law firm even though it devastated the NRA’s finances.
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Here is something to remember before another members’ meeting:
The meeting has an agenda. The agenda itself must be approved. IF the approval of the agenda has not happened before the meeting begins, then (I think) the approval of the agenda would happen at the VERY start of the meeting.
IF the approval of the agenda is done by vote of members present, then the FIRST thing to do is to vote AGAINST an agenda with a set and definite end time. Presumably, what would be done is that someone from the floor would move for an amendment to the agenda, with the amendment eliminating the end time. That would allow the meeting to go as long as necessary.
Members would need to understand that trick in advance. When the agenda is accepted as “routine,” then there is a race against a clock. It is fortunate that Amanda Suffecool was at the mic at three minutes before noon and had the presence to call for a vote on the question. If Suffecool had not done so, the members would not have even the small win of getting into the record that members do NOT support the move to Texas.
What those who write the agenda always want to do is run out the clock before opposition can do anything. Much that happened in the short two hours of the meeting on Saturday, May 18, was just time-waste to eat up the brief 120 minutes.
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