Should the NRA fear losing its ‘nonprofit status’?

(The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Philip Hackney, University of Pittsburgh (THE CONVERSATION) Oliver North sought a second term as president of the National Rifle… (The Conversation is an independent and nonprofit source of news, analysis and commentary from academic experts.) Philip Hackney, University of Pittsburgh (THE CONVERSATION) Oliver North sought a second term as president of the National Rifle Association. It was not to be. NRA first Vice President Richard Childress read a note from North aloud to thousands of the gun group’s members at their annual convention in Indianapolis. It relayed news of the retired lieutenant colonel’s departure and raised the specter of an existential threat to the organization. As North had put it in a letter to the NRA board: “I am deeply concerned that these allegations of financial improprieties could threaten our nonprofit status.” Could they? And what did North mean when he expressed concern about the NRA’s “nonprofit status”? I’m an attorney who has worked for the Internal Revenue Service on legal matters associated with tax-exempt organizations and a professor who studies nonprofit law. It strikes me as unlikely that the IRS would strip the NRA of its tax-exempt status. At the same time, I think it’s possible that the New York authorities investigating the group might remove officers and members of its 76-member board of directors. There is even a slight possibility, as NRA CEO Wayne LaPierre warned in a fundraising letter, that New York authorities could cause the NRA “to shut down forever.” But I doubt it. The NRA and the IRS The NRA consists of multiple kinds of entities, including a political action committee and four affiliated charities. But its mainstay, which North led until this leadership showdown, is what’s known as a social welfare organization under section 501(c)(4)

Read more from our friends at the NRA...