The ongoing civil war between the NRA and its former money backers and PR firm Ackerman McQueen continues to heat up. The Wall Street Journal reports that it looks like NRA money was used to charter private jet flights to and from Nebraska for family members of longtime NRA head Wayne LaPierre. According to the Journal, reporters have seen emails and flight records that seem to confirm that the tax-exempt nonprofit gun organization seems to have paid for things like a private flight detour to pick up “Colleen Sterner, a niece of Susan LaPierre, [who] lives in Nebraska and is a low-level employee of the gun-rights group.”
This is just one example, according to the Journal, of the LaPierre family’s Second Amendment-funded luxury spending. According to the paper, the average cost for the kind of detouring the LaPierres did costs around $5,000 a pop. The NRA, through a spokesman, told the WSJ that these flights were business flights, and Sterner was getting that sweet private flight “in connection with her professional responsibilities.” However, according to the Journal, the LaPierres seem to like to reroute and stop off in Nebraska in between flights to Washington and Dallas. Coincidentally, Dallas is also where the LaPierres were reportedly looking to purchase a $6 million luxury mansion—with NRA money.
How the Wall Street Journal got its hands on these flight logs and emails is anybody’s guess. But considering the back and forth “Gun guy said vs. other gun guy said” nature of the battle between the NRA and Ackerman McQueen, betting odds are that someone accidentally dropped important papers on the floor—in front of the Wall Street Journal.
The LaPierre travel and wardrobe bill has been the subject of much ongoing speculation, including allegations of spending in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for expensive suits and luxury trips.