The NRA Welcomed Maria Butina--Even As She Worked to Arm Anti-American Thugs Abroad

[DonViejo]

While NRA leaders embraced her, Butina denounced US sanctions and advised a militia group helping Putin seize Crimea.

MARK FOLLMAN AND HANNAH LEVINTOVAFEBRUARY 7, 2019 9:45 AM

The American public has continued to know little about Maria Butina, who pleaded guilty in December to participating in a foreign conspiracy against the United States. Not much has emerged about the confessed Russian agent’s political activities beyond her efforts to build ties with Republican leaders and top officials of the National Rifle Association. But Butina wasn’t just a fan of gun rights who attended American University, romanced a veteran Republican operative, and pitched US-Russian collaboration at NRA conventions.

Mother Jones has uncovered a trail of activity showing that during the same period when top NRA leaders welcomed Butina into the fold—meeting with her extensively in Moscow and the United States—Butina actively supported Russian President Vladimir Putin’s military takeover of Crimea. In the immediate aftermath of the invasion and annexation in March 2014, Butina denounced retaliatory sanctions by the Obama administration and traveled to Crimea to promote the arming of pro-Russian separatists. Her efforts there included pledging support to a leader of a militia group that violently seized a Crimean news outlet it deemed “pro-American” and swiftly repurposed for a Kremlin propaganda operation.

As multiple congressional probes of NRA ties with Russia intensify, the NRA now says it had no official connection to a trip NRA leaders took to Moscow to meet with Butina’s gun group and Kremlin officials—a claim Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden, who is leading one of the probes, calls “not credible.” Butina’s role in Crimea raises additional questions about why the NRA—known historically for its hawkish “freedom loving” image—spent years getting close with a Russian national who was doing work hostile to US national security interests.

By late 2013, NRA leaders had already forged ties with Butina’s boss, Alexander Torshin, a high-level official from Putin’s party who was hosted by NRA board member and past president David Keene at NRA annual conventions. (Torshin was sanctioned by the US government last April and described as an unidentified co-conspirator in Butina’s indictment.) In November 2013, Keene traveled to Moscow, where he gave a speech to Butina’s fledgling group, the Right to Bear Arms, offering to “work together” to advance common interests. Also at that time, future Trump national security adviser John Bolton, then a member of the NRA’s international affairs subcommittee, recorded a video address to the Russians talking up gun rights, which Butina used to lobby the Russian legislature.

Butina had been cultivating partnerships with gun rights groups internationally—but four months later, she mobilized to expand her group into Crimea in a starkly different context. On March 17, 2014, after Putin sent in troops and used an illegal referendum to declare Crimea part of the Russian Federation, President Barack Obama announced sanctions in response, including against entities operating in the Russian arms sector. That same day, Butina posted a lengthy commentary online warning that the Obama sanctions would “bankrupt the Russian arms industry,” calling them “a direct threat to national security.” She soon announced plans to travel to Crimea the following week, to establish offices for her group there and advise local citizens on arming themselves under Russian law. Butina stated in the local press that “security problems” in Crimea would persist, and that there was a need to develop civilian “self-defense units” to help uphold the new Russian order.

more
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/02/nra-russia-maria-butina-putin-crimea/

[niyad]

1. "The Maria Butina Song (I Can Get A Man With A Gun)" Sandy and Richard Riccardi

[cp]

2. NRA, R is for Russia

From the article: "In a statement provided to Mother Jones, NRA counsel William Brewer said: 'NRA executives were unaware of the alleged activities in question and the organization is not in a position to comment on them.' "

That NRA was unaware is not credible.

[Sneederbunk]

3. When are NRA people going to be subpoenaed by investigative committees?