The arrest of Russian national Maria Butina on allegations of being a foreign agent has put the spotlight on Bellevue's Second Amendment Foundation, its founder, Alan Gottlieb, and others in America's gun-rights community.
The photo posted online in 2013[1] of the Bellevue-based Second Amendment Foundation’s Alan Gottlieb, wearing a pinstripe suit and his signature bow tie, might look like any random snapshot from a formal networking dinner.
Except this photo was taken in Moscow. And it includes Maria Butina, a Russian national arrested this week on allegations of being an unregistered foreign agent.
Butina’s arrest has put the spotlight on Gottlieb and others in America’s gun-rights community for their interactions with the Russian citizen and onetime leader of a firearms-advocacy organization.
Prosecutors have accused Butina of being part of a conspiracy to infiltrate American political networks in order to report back to the Russian federation, according to news reports[2]. That conspiracy began sometime in 2015, according to charging documents, and possibly earlier.Most Read Local Stories
Unlimited Digital Access. $1 for 4 weeks.[3]In an interview Wednesday, Gottlieb says that while he and Butina corresponded and saw each other at conferences over a few years, her arrest caught him off-guard.
“Quite frankly, when she was arrested, I was in shock,” said Gottlieb, 71. He described his interactions with her as “totally aboveboard.”
Over the years, working out of his Bellevue office, Gottlieb has built a mini-empire of free-market and gun-rights advocacy[4]. Among others, his operations include the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF), a publishing company, a direct-mail service and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms.
That work led Gottlieb about a decade ago to help form the International Association for
