As the NRA struggles, the gun lobby has a new leader in D.C.
Last year, the NRA and the NSSF spent nearly twice as much on federal lobbying.
The gun lobby’s top Washington advocate is spending more money than ever before to influence the federal governments. The group claims that President Joe Biden is waging a war against the Second Amendment. The group opposes all efforts to implement universal background checks, and believes that cracking down on “ghost” guns is unnecessary.
It’s not even the National Rifle Association.
NSSF was founded in 1959 to promote hunting, shooting and recreation. It has since grown into America’s largest trade association for firearms. According to federal records, the organization spent $5.4 million in federal lobbying in 2013, more than any other year of its history. It was also more than twice what the NRA spent.
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NRA, long associated with gun rights movement, has been struggling with a declining membership and revenue as well as scandals within the organization. Last month, the NRA’s longtime leader Wayne LaPierre was found guilty of corruption by a New York judge.
The NRA’s troubles, which include a reduction in federal lobbying efforts, have opened up opportunities for other gun rights advocates — notably the NSSF.
The NSSF rejects comparisons with the NRA. It stresses that its trade organization is just that – a group which represents gun manufacturers and retailers, as well as other business interests. Not gun owners, like the NRA.
The NSSF, formerly known as the National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), tends to have a more conciliatory tone than its better-known rival, highlighting its regulatory focus and partnership with federal agencies that it criticizes. This is in contrast to NRA’s strategy of no compromise.
The two groups do share some core beliefs, including opposing universal background check, the “red flag” laws that have been passed in over 20 states, and attempts to mandate safe firearm storage. Even the NSSF critics believe that it is well positioned to affect gun policy.
Kris Brown, president of Brady (a group dedicated to preventing gun violence), said that being less well-known was a great tactical advantage. People don’t know about them, and they aren’t going after them.
The NSSF, unlike other trade groups that represent different industries, is not just advocating on behalf of businesses, but also “protecting the exercise of a Constitutional right,” according to Larry Keane. Keane is the NSSF’s chief lobbyist and general counsel.
Keane stated in an interview that “the product is firearms and you can’t separate the politics from it.”
The group tries to keep its reputation as a staunch supporter of the Second Amendment, while also portraying itself as a pragmatist similar to other business groups that represent less controversial industries.
Geneva Solomon, a California gun store owner who has worked with NSSF in order to promote firearms’ safety, believes that the trade group is more open to dialog than the NRA. She thinks this is important for changing public perceptions of guns.
Solomon, a member of the NRA and both groups, said that “the NRA’s message was like, if you are anti-gun we won’t talk to you.” “We want to change the story when it comes firearms.”
Gun control advocates counter that the NRA is masquerading under the NRA as a group more reasonable in its gun rights, while still holding the same hard-line views.
Brown stated that the group was trying to make it appear as if they were a gun safety organization. Brown said, “But they spend huge amounts of cash to try and overturn some of the most fundamental gun laws in this country.”
The NSSF says it is not trying to replace the NRA, and that its commitment to safety, as demonstrated by its efforts to improve the federal background checks system, is real.
Keane, a gun control advocate, said: “I think the NSSF is threatening them.” Because we are not easily caricatured. The NSSF, founded in 1961 during the rise of anti-hunting movements, soon became the leading arms and ammunition manufacturers in the country. Keane led a group that launched a legal fund to defend gun manufacturers who were sued by cities in the 1990s.
After the Newtown shooting massacre, federal legislators began to consider sweeping changes in gun control laws. Newtown is the town where NSSF’s headquarters was located until recently. Gun groups, including the NSSF, began lobbying in a big way after the legislative effort.
The NRA led the opposition to a bipartisan bill that would have required universal background checks. Although the NSSF was also against the bill, it stayed largely in the shadows during the debate.
In 2019, the NRA started to make significant cuts in federal lobbying due to internal turmoil. The NSSF, meanwhile, has more than 10,000 members in the midst of booming gun sales. This has helped the group to expand its efforts to influence legislators, which have taken on a new urgency under Biden.
The Biden administration established the first federal office to prevent gun violence last year. This office coordinates executive actions on gun safety. The White House has also sought to revoking more licenses for gun dealers who break the law, expanding background checks, and tightening gun exports.
The NSSF has slammed such efforts as a whole-of-government assault on our industry and the Second Amendment, as Keane said, and it often refers to Biden’s line during a Democratic primary debate in 2019: “Our enemy are the gun manufacturers, but not the NRA.”
When asked for comment, Biden’s administration reaffirmed its criticism of industry and cited the high toll gun violence has taken in America. Gun manufacturers and their representatives are ignoring this carnage. They’re blocking even the most basic gun safety measures, according to Jeremy Edwards.
The NSSF focuses primarily on federal agencies. It often ties policy niches to the long-standing concerns expressed by the gun rights movement.
Its current priority is to stop credit card companies creating a new code for merchants to flag purchases of firearms. Some firms started implementing this after critics claimed that financial institutions enabled mass shootings.
The NSSF says that such practices could violate gun purchasers’ privacy and be abused for political reasons by the government. The group, in a statement released recently, echoed warnings from gun rights advocates that the government wants to create a registry of gun owners. This would be a step towards eliminating legal gun possession.
Robert J. Spitzer said that the NSSF has an “increasingly political agenda.” Spitzer is an expert in gun politics and a professor emeritus of SUNY Cortland. “They have
