Consider This from NPR - Secret Tapes Of NRA Leadership Reveal Debate Of Post-Columbine Strategy

Episode Date: November 10, 2021

Following the Columbine shooting in April of 1999, top leaders of the National Rifle Association huddled in private to discuss their public response to the tragedy. Secret tapes of those deliberations were obtained by NPR investigative correspondent Tim Mak. He explains what's revealed in the tapes: that the group considered a much different stance than the one it ultimately took — a stance that would help set the stage for decades of debate about gun violence in America. Tim Mak is also author of the book Misfire: Inside the Downfall of the NRA.In participating regions, you'll also hear a local news segment that will help you make sense of what's going on in your community.Email us at [e-mail] more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Just a heads up here. We're going to start this episode with some news reports from April 20th, 1999, the day of the Columbine shooting. Good day. John Roberts from CBS News headquarters in New York with an update now on that school shooting at the Columbine High School in Littleton, Colorado. That day, two teenagers walked into their high school armed with semi-automatic weapons and sawed-off shotguns. They fired a total of 188 rounds of ammunition. Who did you see with guns? We saw these two kids. They were white and they had black trench coats on. You saw two students with black trench coats on holding guns? Yeah, they were shooting people and stuff.

One teacher and 12 students were killed. The two teenagers responsible took their own lives. This tragedy is about an hour and a half old now. Apparently the SWAT team has mobilized outside of the school. In the days that followed, while those images were still fresh on TV, leaders of the National Rifle Association huddled in private. They were, Craig and Mary were just showing me the hate mail that's coming into the building, leaders of the National Rifle Association huddled in private. Craig and Mary were just showing me the hate mail that's coming into the building.

I don't know how much it is, but I've got a stack here. It's pretty nasty. About 50 or 60. This is a recording that has never been heard before. NPR has obtained more than two and a half hours of tapes like it, where you can hear NRA officials debating their public response to Columbine. The issue they grappled with, whether to move forward with their annual meeting, a massive and expensive conference scheduled only days later in Denver, just half an hour's drive from Columbine High School. Here's the NRA's top official, Wayne LaPierre, and lobbyist, Marion Hammer.

We have meeting insurance. Screw the insurance. The message that it will send is that even the NRA was brought to its knees, and the media will have a field day with it. Consider this. The NRA's response to Columbine helped set the stage for the next 20 years of debate about gun violence in America. Now, secret tapes reveal the group considered a much different stance than the one it ultimately took. From NPR, I'm Mary Louise Kelly.

It's Wednesday, November 10th. This message comes from NPR. The NRA ultimately did move forward with its convention in May of 1999, barely two weeks after the Columbine shooting. I am very happy to welcome you

to this abbreviated annual gathering of the National Rifle Association. Then-President Charlton Heston opened the meeting, which had been pared down a bit. Outside the conference, thousands of protesters gathered. Inside, Heston delivered a defiant message, one that sounds a lot like the NRA's position on mass shootings today, namely that the national media is not to be trusted and any conversation about guns and the NRA after mass shootings is playing politics with a private tragedy. Why us? Because their story needs a villain. They want us to play the heavy in their drama of packaged grief, to provide riveting programming to run between commercials for cars and cat food.

The dirty secret of this day and age is that political gain and media ratings all too often bloom on fresh graves. But as those secret NRA tapes reveal, the group's leadership debated seriously about whether to take that kind of tone. Those tapes were obtained by NPR investigative correspondent Tim Mack. He spoke to Elsa Cheng about what else they tell us. So tell us, how did you get these tapes in the first place? So they were recorded some 22 years ago by a participant on the call who provided it to NPR, and we've taken steps to verify the identities of those on the call.

What you can hear on these tapes is the deliberations about what to do about the annual meeting and the problem of having it so close to the site of the Columbine shootings. About a dozen of the NRA's top executives, officials, lobbyists, and PR strategists are all scrambling onto this conference call. You have Executive Vice President Wayne LaPierre, who's there, and longtime ad man Angus McQueen is too. Marion Hammer, the former NRA president, joins the line. They kind of sound shaken. Here's the NRA's top lobbyist at the time, Jim Baker. This is the same concern, obviously,

that everybody has, is that at the same period where they're going to be burying these children, we're going to be having media within 10 miles of our convention center, the world's media, trying to run through the exhibit hall looking at kids fondling firearms, which is going to be a horrible, horrible, horrible juxtaposition. It's clear to the participants on the call that this is the biggest crisis the NRA has faced in years. It's fascinating. What are some of the possible responses that they're coming up with on this phone call?

So they've got a few options. They can cancel the convention entirely. They can kind of pare it down. And they're also wondering if there's any action they can take. Can they contribute money to the victims, for example? Here's NRA official Kane Robinson. Is there something concrete that we can offer, not because guns are responsible, but because we care about these people? And so they even you giving money? You feel responsible? Well, you're true. It can be twisted, but we feel sympathetic and respectful. So I don't know if you can hear that there. He says respectful. So it's the suggestion of a softer tone. But over the hours of tape, you can hear as they settle

into this view of the position they must take. I've the hours of tape, you can hear as they settle into this view of the position they must take. I gotta tell you, we gotta think this thing through, because if we duck, tail, and run, we're going to be accepting responsibility for what happened out there. That's one very good argument, Jim. On the other side, if you don't appear to be deferential in honoring the dead, you end up being a tremendous shithhead who wouldn't tuck tail and run, you know. So it's a double-edged sword. So you can hear the two competing tensions there. Such an interesting window into this time.

I mean, Tim, you have been covering the NRA for quite some time now, and just listening to these, what, nearly three hours of tapes. I'm just curious what else struck you. So there's been this longstanding internal problem with the group. Often its most radical members are also its most passionate and dedicated. So the NRA exists in part to advocate for the legislation, but there have always been hardline gun activists within the organization, disinterested in any sort of legislative compromises. And on the tape, you can hear the NRA's leaders referring to these members in less than flattering

terms. Here's LaPierre again. You know, the other problem is holding a member meeting without an exhibit hall. You know, yeah. The people you are most likely to get in that member meeting without an exhibit hall are the nuts. That's right. That made that point earlier.

I agree. The fruitcakes are going to show up. They're talking about what's called the annual members meeting. It's an unscripted event where the NRA supporters can propose resolutions or make speeches from the floor. And it's clear the NRA's top leaders feared it would get out of control after Columbine. The next bit I want to play comes from Hammer. If you pull down the exhibit hall, that's not going to leave anything for the media except the members meeting, and you're going to have the wackos with all kinds of crazy resolutions, with all kinds of dressing like a bunch of hillbillies and idiots, and it's going to be the worst thing you can imagine. It's really shocking to hear the NRA's officials

disparage some of their own members so freely when they've had no issue in the past taking this faction's money or mobilizing them when it suits their purposes. Sure, the name-calling and laughing is pretty remarkable. I'm curious, who else did they talk about on this call? Well, let's hear what they have to say about the gun industry. Jim, let me ask you a question. What's the industry going to do? I think the industry will do whatever we ask them to do.

Do you think they have a preference, Jim? Is there anybody we ought to be talking to? I talked to Delfay this morning, and he said they stand ready to help us orchestrate whatever we want to do. They're just waiting to know. Robert Delphi was then the head of a gun industry trade group. Now, some critics accuse the NRA of being beholden to the gun industry. But here in these tapes, the NRA is saying it's the other way around. Now, much like the gun industry, pro-NRA politicians are also looking to the NRA for guidance. Here, LaPierre refers to then-Senate Majority Whip Don Nichols. Well, I was talking to Nicholson's office this morning, and what they told me is they're planning on sending him all to school, because what they wanted us to do was

secretly provide him with talking points. So just to emphasize here, LaPierre is saying that the Republican leader is asking them to secretly provide them notes on what to say. It is so fascinating to listen to these tapes. What do you think these conversations from more than 20 years ago can tell us about the NRA's actions ever since then? Gradually, what we see and what we hear in these tapes is the NRA's playbook emerging, just as America's entering this era of school shootings. The NRA is arguing in these tapes that society, not firearms, is the source of the real problem. And their strategy would really also revolve around skepticism of the press and not wanting to show any signs of weakness. You'll remember after the

Parkland shootings when NRA spokesperson Dana Lash said that, quote, the legacy media loves mass shootings. And that's a strategy that the NRA has used for decades. NPR investigative correspondent Tim Mack. Now, NPR did reach out to the NRA. We provided them with transcripts of the audio used in our reporting in order to protect our source, and in keeping with prior practice, we did not provide the actual tape. An NRA spokesperson called this story a, quote, hit piece and complained they were denied the audio. It's Consider This from NPR. I'm Mary Louise Kelly.