Michael Bloomberg and his billions get most of the attention in the anti-gun universe, but don’t go to sleep on Gabby Giffords and Mark Kelly. The peripatetic duo just announced that they’re merging their civilian disarmament advocacy shop, Americans for Responsible Solutions, with the San Francisco-based Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence. Sometimes mergers like this are done in desperation, the last ditch efforts of two failing organizations to keep their heads above water. But as usatoday.com’s report lays out, this one looks like the firm of Kelly & Giffords saw an opportunity to add some legal muscle to their anti-2A portfolio by taking over a smaller competitor . . .

The Law Center will now operate as part of the Americans for Responsible Solutions Foundation. No change in leadership or staffing is planned at either group.

Americans for Responsible Solutions Foundation took in $159,900 in 2014, according to its most recent tax return filed with the Internal Revenue Service. Americans for Responsible Solutions Political Action Committee raised about $3 million in the final six months of 2015, according to its filing with the Federal Election Commission. There was about $4.2 million in its campaign account at the start of 2016.

The Law Center took in about $1.4 million in 2014, according to its most recent tax return.

USA Today makes sure to cast the newly expanded entity as the scrappy little competitor to the big bad 800 pound pro-gun gorilla.

The NRA’s Political Victory Fund raised $572,406 in January, according to an FEC report, and had $11.3 million in its account to start February. In addition, the NRA Foundation had $41.3 million in revenue in 2013, according to its most recent tax filing, and total assets of $115.2 million.

So yes, the NRA and its estimated five million members can outspend the newly expanded ARS. But again, Bloomberg’s net worth is estimated at over $38 billion which means he could buy and sell the NRA with the cash he keeps in checking if he wanted to. Have you renewed your NRA membership yet?

 

RELATED ARTICLESMORE FROM AUTHOR

36 COMMENTS

  1. Never.All firearm laws or regulations are immoral, so I donate to the only lobby group that shares my views: the GOA.

  2. What ought to concern the NRA is what would happen if the Antis decide to tell their Progressive gun-grabbing buddies to all join the NRA and then vote themselves onto the board. Especially if Bloomie offers to pay for it.

    Just imagine the *fun* they could have…

    • Nah, just reorganize the NRA as a union, adopt their dues schedule and BOOM liberals are funding Ted Nugent’s run for president, and can’t do squat about it.

    • You do know there are limitations on members’ voting rights? As in, you have to be a life member or higher, or have been a regular member for N (5? 10? I forget) before you can vote in an NRA election.

      So I say, sure, go ahead and try it. I think most of the new members wouldn’t realize the gotchas and never renew, so all that would happen is a pop in the NRA’s coffers.

    • The average anti gun prog won’t donate $5 to be a member of their own favorite anti gun organization. I highly doubt any of them would fork over the cash for a NRA life membership. Anti gun groups get most of their money from wealthy donors and grant money. It’s a great way to make money for Mark Kelly. I doubt he ever wants to see any gun laws passed because that would threaten his current cash flow.

    • I’m guessing you’re not an NRA member, otherwise you’d realize the logistics of what you’re suggesting aren’t possible.

      Unless you can drum up millions and millions of progressives willing to plop down $1000 a piece for life memberships.

  4. Not all of the NRA money goes to lobbying Congress. Sometimes (but not often enough) they support lawsuits with plaintiff/defendant funding of legal costs, costs for their own attorneys or expert witnesses to argue cases or testify in court, give supporting testimony with local gun rights groups in front of state legislatures on bills, and such.

    They are getting better.

  5. GGGGuuuns baaaddd. Wee musssstt stoooop. p. p. Pllleez reeeddd mmy whiiittepaaaaapr onnn secnd ameeemndeeent. Thhhhannks yyu.

    ppppsss – plleeez sssendd mooooney twoooo.

    • You know … Making fun of someone’s disability is a good way of self-identifying as a bully and a jack*.

      • “You know … Making fun of someone’s disability is a good way of self-identifying as a bully and a jack*.”

        BS. She literally can’t articulate a complete sentence on her own, yet we’re to believe that she writes letters and opinion pieces on the nuances of the 2nd Amendment? She’s a puppet, in every sense of the word. They give her 40 or 50 WORD speeches that she can’t even finish. The reason they prop her up and try to get her to make it through speeches is exactly the reason you highlighted – they figure she’s immune to criticism. Well, that’s BS. She’s a puppet and her handlers have no shame, but that’s no reason not to call them on it.

        • So blame and mock the people who are using her, then.

          You literally are mocking the victim.

        • You do realize it is possible to have a brain injury that affects speech but does not affect intelligence right. Look at Hawking. Cant talk,walk or pretty much move, yet still considered a genius. Also possible to look and act completely normal and be a blithering idiot.

        • “You literally are mocking the victim.”

          Yeah, let’s not mock the anti-gun former Democrat congresswoman, because she can’t get through a few sentences of prepared remarks, and is clearly advocating changes to our fundamental rights that she – literally – cannot comprehend. Johnny, you’re falling for their nonsense of propping up these people who they think are untouchable. Supposedly we couldn’t criticize Jim Brady because he was shot in the head, and this puppet because she was shot in the head.

          Your PC proclivities don’t override my gun rights. Seriously, “Better not say ill of this woman working to destroy your gun rights!” Wake the hell up, Johnny. PC is a good way to lose what you’re fighting for, assuming you’re actually on our side.

          You know what would be funny, seeing her debate a box of sticks about gun rights. It’s a tossup who’d win.

        • You know, you’re both making a lot of assumptions.

          Re Prof. Hawking, correct, you can have a brain injury that makes it hard to speak. Have you noticed his speech synthesizer? There are alternatives so long as a person is not completely trapped in his body.

          I’m not being PC. I just prefer to, first, direct anger and vile against the proper targets, and second, to not make myself look like an ass in the process. You want to, by all means go ahead.

          If you think someone calling you a jack* on a gun blog for mocking someone’s disability, and that that translates to my threatening your 2A rights (and wow, that 1A thing really sucks when everyone gets to use it, doesn’t it?) I strongly suspect you have bigger problems than me wrt your gun rights.

  6. I absolutely despise Mark Kelly. He trots out his poor wife and uses her as not much more than a fund-raising tool.

    Whatever Ms. Giffords stance on guns before being shot, any animosity I might have had is long gone. All we see now is a shell of a human being that is being exploited by a bunch of ruthless degenerates who shamelessly use her to further their power grasping agenda.

  7. Two astroturf orgs merged. Is it a problem? Sure, but remember it’s all smoke and mirrors. I live in the “blue” area of my state (Florida) and have yet to meet anyone who is truly virulently anti-gun, though my social media feeds tell me these people exist, somewhere. Americans are generally pro-gun or ambivalent to the issue. The trick is convincing those ambivalent people to our side.

  8. I don’t understand the gun-grabbers with deep pockets. Gates and Bloomberg alone could easily buy out ALL the firearms manufacturers in the U.S. and then promptly bulldoze all the manufacturing facilities … and voila, no more firearms in the United States.

    And both of them would STILL have billions of dollars left over. It really makes me question their actual motives.

    • For every factory he bulldozed two would spring up since gun prices would spike, attracting new entrants to the industry….

    • Even if they wanted to they’d never be allowed to, Beretta, FN, H&K, S&W to name just a few with US presence, either have direct government full/part ownership or supply so many military and police weapons systems the takeovers would be blocked.

      Plus who would supply their armed guards after the closure and gun buy backs?

  9. “Have you renewed your NRA membership yet?” No, people with some I.Q. and brains don’t feed an org that deliberately sells them out to police unions to be set up and killed.

    That’s what NRA state lobbyist Todd Vandermyde “accomplished” when he placed Duty to Inform w/ criminal penalties in Illlinois 2013 carry bill. Orland Park police chief Tim McCarthy was president of the IL Chiefs of Police when Vandermyde cut the deal on DTI. The IL Chiefs opposed citizen carry in IL for FORTY YEARS, but the NRA rat wanted to “get a bill passed” so he keeps getting his 1099 from Chris Cox & Chuck Cunningham at NRA-ILA. Vandermyde is a contract lobbyist. He’ll sell out Otis McDonald and every other NRA member to the lowest bidder.

    Chief Tim McCarthy is the same Tim McCarthy who was a Secret Service agent when President Reagan was shot, and the same Tim McCarthy who promotes gun control with Jim & Sarah Brady. NRA is a rotten front full of backstabbing scum like Vandermyde that are in bed with the anti-gun groups. Gabby Giffords should just buy ILA as a fully owned subsidiary. NRA is doing their job for them already.

    • The NRA is still A LOT friendlier to 2A issues than any of the current GOP presidential candidates. Cruz “possibly” excepted, but he’s still more likely to compromise, given he is less of a single issue guy than the NRA is.

      In addition to what the NRA does and actually is, there is also the symbolism behind them. To ignoramus antigunners (redundant, I know), NRA is THE pro gun organization. THE enemy. The bigger and more well funded they are, the less likely politicians “in the middle” (which these days mean: Can’t quite decide whether to fellate Hitler or Stalin), are to try their luck in the progressive swamp.

      So, keep memberships current. I can sympathize with spending any spare change on the GOA or other more “principled” organizations, but what the NRA can lack in principledness, they make up for in size and reach, hence effectiveness.

  10. Spending wars for programs & ventures will always remain unchanged. One change that could be done, as well as being a great test of ‘…walking the walk.’ would be the legal removal of Gabby’s guns and forbidding her access to them until such time she can prove compentcy. Yeah, Marks guns go as well. This is no more than they are trying to do with all Veterans under the guise of PTSD, TBI and other traumatic & cognitive disorders

    Wonder what their reaction would be if all their states of residence took this action?

  11. “No guns for you!” Says the women who has her name slapped on SeaRam and 57mm.

    “Have you renewed your NRA membership yet?”

    I will when they remind me. Just kidding I’d be bankrupt if I did that.

  13. Why is it when I see those two I can’t help but see Jeff Dunham and Walter… in an astronaut suit.

  14. The photo above is just priceless. Takes me back to my childhood in the world of black and white children’s programs with cowboy puppets and cowboy hosts. .

Comments are closed.