October 2024 -

NRA Petition Candidates Round-Up (Updated)

Last minute note: The top three listed – Babaz, Brown, and Lee – may not have enough to make on the ballot. If you can get a petition to them directly by Monday, it may help put them over the top.

I received a suggestion from Stephen Wenger of the Defensive Use of Firearms digest that it would be helpful to put links to all the petition candidates in one post. I quite agree.

His second suggestion was to remind readers that if they are signing multiple petitions, it would easier and cheaper to send them all to Rocky Marshall. He is right!

An important note – Rocky needs to get them by September 30th so they can be sent to the individual candidates. Under the NRA’s antiquated rules, petitions can only be submitted to the NRA by the candidate and no one else. The NRA’s deadline to have them delivered to the Office of the Secretary is October 8th.

That address is Frontier Truck Gear, Attn Rocky Marshall, PO Box 277, Center Point, TX 78010.

Here are the links in no particular order:

Paul Babaz

Charlie Brown

Willes Lee

Jim Porter

Frank Tait

Scott Emslie

Todd Figard

Howard Massingill

Jonathan Goldstein

Jim Sheckels

Jason Wilson

Todd Vandermyde

Theresa Inacker

And finally, there is me (John Richardson). I am still running for the Board by petition.

Time is getting critical as we have only about two weeks to finish gathering petitions. If you have a club meeting in the next week or so, print out some or all of the petitions and ask voting members to sign. If you have a shooting competition this next weekend, do likewise. If you have a gun show next weekend, consider taking petitions with you and asking people to sign.

The key thing to remember is that you are doing this for the future of the NRA. All of us above are just your tools to effect change. As someone told me in an email when he sought to have friends at the range sign my petition, they all expressed disappointment in the NRA and were waiting to see change before they could be bothered to sign my petition.

We are all disappointed but if we keep waiting for change before acting, it will never get done. You, I, and everyone else needs to act now!

You Did It! I Made My NRA Petition Numbers

547 petition signatures with membership numbers sent by UPS Next Day Air to the NRA Office of the Secretary.

236 petition sheets with an average of 2.32 signatures per page.

The stack was about 1.5 inches and weighed just under three pounds.

USPS came through by delivering enough petitions with signatures on Friday to surpass the bylaw required number of 398.

I could not have done this without the aid of all of you who mailed me your petitions directly, those who signed a petition at a gun club, or those who mailed their petitions to Rocky Marshall in Texas for forwarding to me.

Beyond the many individuals who sent me their petition, I would like especially to thank Karl Rehn, Phil Journey, “Bitter”, and Todd Vandermyde for gathering multiple sheets of signatures at events like a class or GRPC and at their respective gun clubs. I also want to thank Rocky Marshall who helped coordinate the gathering of petitions for all the reform candidates and then sending them forward. Finally, a big thanks to Buz Mills of Gunsite for a huge email push, to the Board of Directors of California Rifle and Pistol Association for suggesting their members consider signing candidates’ petitions, and to the Indiana State Rifle and Pistol Association which did likewise.

Two things were made very clear through this whole process to me. First, there are many, many individual NRA members who are not happy with the current state of things and want reform. Second, the number of people who have dropped their NRA annual memberships over the past few years is extraordinarily large. This was due in large part to a) disgust over the corruption and grifting by Wayne and his friends, b) the failure by many long-time members on the current Board to do their fiduciary duty, and c) a feeling that the NRA was no longer relevant in the fight for the Second Amendment as they had compromised one time too many. Any current board member that does not recognize that sticking to the “old ways” and looking the other way contributed in large part to the huge decline in membership of the NRA should think twice about remaining on the board.

To conclude, I want to reiterate my great thanks to all who signed my petition and those of other 13 reform candidates. I think all will be on the ballot come 2025.