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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsAt Least 3 Clear Violations Of Federal Laws-NRA committing same crimes Al Capone got busted for
The NRAs brazen shell game with donations: A Yahoo News investigation
Alan Berlow for Yahoo News
April 21, 2015
Early last summer I began making contributions to the National Rifle Association a dollar here, a dollar there to see where my money would end up. Some of it quickly found its way into the account of the National Rifle Association Political Victory Fund, the NRAs political action committee. And that was of no small interest, because I never knowingly contributed to the NRA-PVF. For me, this wasnt a big problem; my contributions were a spit in the bucket for an organization that spent $37 million on the 2014 elections and operates on an annual budget of more than a quarter of a billion dollars. But my contributions and others like them may be a big problem for the NRA because, according to some of the nations top experts on federal election law, they are all illegal.
The issue is not just that my donations ended up in a political fund account, but the way the NRA solicited them and presumably those of thousands of others. In fact, each of these transactions almost certainly violated multiple provisions of the Federal Election Campaign Act (FECA) and a legion of state and federal antifraud statutes designed to protect the public from phony charities and false or misleading solicitations.
The FECA makes a hard distinction between solicitations for elections and other solicitations, in part because many Americans dont like donating to politicians. An NRA member might contribute to the organization because she admires its work on behalf of hunters. She might also contribute to an environmental group because she wants to preserve forests. But this same donor may vehemently oppose the candidates endorsed in federal elections by both the NRA and the environmental group. As a result, the law makes it clear that when these groups are soliciting for electoral purposes they must disclose that fact to potential donors.
If a private citizen says hes raising money for a cancer charity and deposits the money into his personal bank account, he can be prosecuted for committing a fraud. Similarly, under federal election law, corporations like the NRA that set up what are known as connected PACs must inform potential donors if a PAC is the intended beneficiary of a solicitation. The NRA cant claim to be raising money for the corporation to finance such things as its lobbying or research initiatives and then deposit that money into the account of its PAC. But thats precisely what the NRA did when it solicited my contributions.
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Oh yes, there is MORE:
https://www.yahoo.com/politics/the-nras-deceptive-shell-game-with-donations-a-116744915796.html
Romeo.lima333
(1,127 posts)Hoyt
(54,770 posts)John Bolton, Ollie North, Teddy Nugent and a host of other right wingers have nothing to do with the political arm.
Truth, the NRA is promoting more than just gunz for crazies, yet we are supposed to accept it with a smile.
SwankyXomb
(2,030 posts)in the same way that Sinn Féin and the Provisional IRA were completely separate.
ileus
(15,396 posts)gejohnston
(17,502 posts)income tax evasion, not election laws.
drm604
(16,230 posts)gejohnston
(17,502 posts)and is legally separate. That is the organization that would report them. The article doesn't make it clear if the writer is referring to the ILA or the NRA per se.
Questions that came to my mind were:
How did he track where his donations went? He didn't say which branch he was donating to. He also doesn't point to a FEC regulation he said they were violating.
I'm not saying there isn't truth to it, just that when I think of competent, professional investigative journalism, Yahoo doesn't come to mind.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)gejohnston
(17,502 posts)I have read his stuff before. He doesn't impress me as being much. Does he have a background in election law, or be paid enough by Yahoo to cover hiring one for help?
If Holder can put together a prosecutable case, then I'll be impressed.
DeSwiss
(27,137 posts)I don't know this person as a writer, I just noticed when I wanted to see his credentials that he's done some NRA articles before. Usually when you suck you don't many submissions accepted. Of course when online publications need content they may not care about the substance so much, as long as they get the lines they need.
flamin lib
(14,559 posts)Omaha Steve
(99,632 posts)But the tea-publicans want smaller government so this crap goes on without prosecution!
K&R!
OS
Fred Sanders
(23,946 posts)Though how that is even possible is a question.
frylock
(34,825 posts)see also Cliven Bundy.
Paladin
(28,257 posts)okaawhatever
(9,462 posts)vkkv
(3,384 posts)A lot of kooks in the NRA still think that President Obama is a Muslim terrorists and that the Apocalypse and Rapture will be arriving shortly.
These people are a danger to everyone who prefers a peaceful existence.
hack89
(39,171 posts)specifically responsible for running the NRA's PACs and is shocked to discover his money ended up in a NRA PAC?
MisterP
(23,730 posts)they ain't goin' nowhere