The National Rifle Association will not host Former President Donald Trump in Savannah, Georgia, next week.
The gun-rights group announced the cancelation of the rally on Thursday. The group said “campaign scheduling changes” forced them to abandon the event, but didn’t detail what created the scheduling conflict. Additionally, the decision to cancel the event came just days after the new NRA CEO’s involvement in a decades-old animal abuse scandal was brought back to light.
“The NRA is committed to ensuring Donald Trump wins in November and returns to the White House,” a statement sent to The Reload by spokesman Nick Perrine said.
The Trump Campaign directed questions to the NRA, which did not answer questions about what role, if any, the animal abuse story played in the event’s cancelation.
With the group’s fundraising and spending power greatly diminished from previous cycles, the NRA has leaned into hosting events this year to boost the former president’s prospects in the election. The event’s cancelation deals another blow to the NRA’s capacity to impact the election, even as it remains the largest pro-gun player in the political realm. It may also be the first sign of fallout from the group’s latest scandal, even as it has yet to fully settle the legal fight over its previous corruption scandal.
Doug Hamlin was elected by the NRA board of directors to be the group’s Chief Executive Officer and Executive Vice President in May. He ran as a reform candidate who would help right the ship after Wayne LaPierre, the group’s longtime leader, was found liable by a jury for diverting millions of dollars in NRA funds toward his own personal expenses. He and other reformers have been locked in a fight with the remaining LaPierre allies still inside the organization on the direction the group should take.
However, Hamlin has come under heavy scrutiny as the new leader of the NRA. On Monday, The Guardian published a story resurfacing news of Hamlin’s role in an animal abuse incident during his time as president of a University of Michigan frat house in 1979. According to contemporaneous local reporting reviewed by The Reload, a group of the frat brothers was upset with the cat, named BK, for not using its litter box. So, they caught the cat, cut off its paws, strung it up by a tree, and set it on fire.
“I do not in any way condone the actions that took place more than 44 years ago,” Hamlin said of the incident. “I took responsibility for this regrettable incident as chapter president although I wasn’t directly involved.”
Reporting from the time is not perfectly clear on exactly what Hamlin’s role was in the killing. He may not have been involved in the act itself, but there are reports he knew about it and could have stopped it. A cook at the house also accused Hamlin of threatening him in an effort to cover up the mutilation after the fact.
Hamlin and four other men were expelled from the fraternity over the incident. They all pled no contest to misdemeanor animal cruelty charges and were ordered to pay a few hundred dollars in fines and fees while completing 200 hours of community service before their records could be expunged. However, the judge singled out Hamlin as particularly responsible for the incident.
“You had the ability to prevent this from ever happening,” Judge S. J. Elden told Hamlin during sentencing, according to The Michigan Daily.
Hamlin remains the head of the NRA. He argued in a statement earlier this week that who he is today shouldn’t be judged based on the decades-old incident.
“Since that time I served my country, raised a family, volunteered in my community, started a business, worked with Gold Star families and raised millions of dollars for charity,” he said. “I’ve endeavored to live my life in a manner beyond reproach. My focus now is on protecting the 2nd Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens.”
Meanwhile, the NRA said it remained committed to the re-election of Former President Donald Trump despite the cancelation of the Georgia event.
“NRA-PVF just launched statewide radio ads in the battleground states of Pennsylvania and Georgia to complement a comprehensive GOTV operation and multi-million dollar digital outreach strategy to defeat Kamala Harris,” the group said in a statement.
