The new National Rifle Association (NRA) Board of Directors meets this morning to determine the future of the organization. I am heading home so won’t be attending, but I attended the meeting of members on Saturday and there was some evidence that winds of reform were blowing through the organization.

To wit: Here’s a nearly complete video of debate on a members’ resolution to support moving the NRA to Texas. The resolution was defeated. Some NRA board members spoke against the NRA staff supporting it. Will this reform/resistance carry over to Monday?

I’m not an expert on the NRA or NRA politics, but I was surprised, for example, at the amount of vocal resistance to NRA President Charles Cotton when he tried to dress down board member Amanda Suffacool when she spoke against the resolution.

Cotton also wandered aimlessly into a field of landmines when he, with characteristic hubris, challenged Rob Pincus and gave Pincus an opportunity to ask if board member David Coy had a hand in writing the members’ resolution. Cotton could not even understand Pincus’ question and Coy had to sheepishly admit that he did in fact write the “members'” resolution.

Even here in the deep red gun heart of Texas, the attendance at the NRA annual meeting is clearly down. How far down I can’t say but am interested to see what attendance number the NRA publishes. I’m sure vendors will be able to speak to this.

When I spoke at the National Firearms Law Seminar in 2019 in Indy, there were around 300 attendees IIRC. When I spoke there on Friday, there were 125 registrants and fewer attendees.

I’ll be interested to see how the board of directors meeting on Monday goes. Will the board circle the wagons and support the leadership that, along with WLP, put the organization in its current state? Or will reformers make inroads?

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