NEW YORK – Everytown for Gun Safety today responded to a report that former NRA president and current NRA board member, Pete Brownell is resigning from the NRA board of directors.
“To see a former NRA president step down from the board is not surprising given the organization’s ongoing turmoil,” said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety. “What would be surprising is if this is the last resignation we see.”
Brownell, who is the owner of a major supplier of firearm accessories called Brownells, served as president of the NRA from 2017 to 2018, and on the board for nearly a decade. His resignation comes as the NRA undergoes scrutiny — including an investigation from the New York Attorney General office — following multiple reports of questionable financial transactions across the NRA. The revelations include the disclosure that the NRA Foundation has been purchasing millions of dollars of merchandise from Crow Shooting Supply, a business owned by Brownells.
As the NRA’s First Vice President in 2015, Brownell headed an NRA delegation trip to Moscow, in which NRA officials toured a Russian gun manufacturer and met with the Russian gun group founded by purported lifetime NRA member Maria Butina. Butina was sentenced to 18 months in prison for “conspiracy to act as an agent of the Russian Federation within the United States without prior notification to the attorney general.”