Show Notes

The NRA is characterized by NPR investigative reporter Tim Mak as "the most powerful political advocacy group in the country" but he adds it's also an organization that's stumbled badly in recent years.
In "Misfire," Mak relates some of the problems--lavish spending by NRA executives including CEO Wayne LaPierre--while rank-and-file employees of the NRA, a non-profit, are underpaid.
Having performed hundreds of interviews from inside the NRA, Mak told Steve Tarter that after the Sandy Hook school shooting in 2011, the organization went from taking a gun-rights stand that would seek to involve Democrats on occasion to a "culture war" organization that relied strictly on conservative support.
The NRA spent $30 million on the Donald Trump candidacy in 2016, said Mak, but, ironically, was less successful during the Trump administration than in previous years.
Mak also points out how the NRA was "played" by Russian intelligence as NRA executives made a 2015 trip to Moscow, a by-invitation affair that was packed with meetings with Russian government officials, diplomats, and oligarchs--all seeking influence in American politics. 
Despite all this, even a crippled NRA remains a political powerhouse, warns Mak.