The NRA’s use of its nonprofit has come into question over the past year as investigators go through the financially distressed organization’s accounting. Helped by inflammatory allegations being lobbed back and forth between the NRA and its former PR firm/financial backer Ackerman McQueen, tales of lavish spending on the part of NRA top honcho Wayne LaPierre have made for mirth-filled articles. Recent reports that the NRA, and specifically LaPierre, seriously looked into using NRA money to purchase a $6 million “luxury mansion” for LaPierre and his wife in the Dallas area made headlines all last week. The Daily Beast reports that the NRA spent “tens of thousands of dollars bringing hair and makeup artists around the country” in to work on Susan LaPierre.
Susan LaPierre is a public face of the NRA. She heads the organization’s Women’s Leadership Forum. According to the Daily Beast, the high price for LaPierre’s styling comes from the couple’s preference for Nashville makeup artists and the need to fly and house them as they follow the LaPierres around the country.
The NRA told reporters that this is just another attempt by Ackerman McQueen to “smear” the LaPierres as the legal battles between the two organizations continue. “Ms. LaPierre and other senior members of the NRA fundraising team participate in TV interviews, nationally-televised speeches, and videos used to raise millions of dollars annually. Hair and make-up services might be used in those instances–coordinated, directed, and paid for by Ackerman. This is another non-story with facts presented out of context–an act of desperation being fueled by the same group of people who attempted to extort Wayne LaPierre and the Association.”
Susan LaPierre is not the first public personality to have a preference for their hair and makeup team. The reality is that most candidates you like and have liked spend thousands of dollars on hair and makeup. However, as the NRA faces financial problems and questions of mismanagement, spending a few extra thousands of dollars on hair and makeup, when you are also suspected of trying to buy multi-million-dollar mansions and throwing away hundreds of thousands of dollars on luxury travel and tailored suits isn’t a good look.
Either way, the legal troubles the NRA is facing are draining further money out of the organization’s coffers, and its ability to fund right-wing do-nothing-on-gun-violence candidates will hopefully be hampered. The phrase The devil is in the details comes to mind. But is there a phrase for when the devil is the one concealing all of the details?