The results of the 2026 NRA Director Election are in with little in the way of surprises. A few people did better than expected, while others underperformed to some degree, but it’s almost all academic, as there were 37 candidates to fill 35 seats, meaning only 2 people were going to end up without a seat.
Add in the 76th Director seat election held at the Annual Meeting of Members, and only one candidate will be left out in the cold, and that race has already been decided.
The two candidates at the bottom of the list turned out to be Isaac Demarest and Lynn Gipson. Demarest has withdrawn himself from the race for 76th, so it will go to Gipson by default – unless there’s another surprise plot twist.
It’s also almost guaranteed that at least one current Director will resign, meaning that Demarest won’t be off the Board for long.
The Good News
Most of you know that there was a rash of resignations toward the end of last year. What you might not have realized is that those resignations included the entire core and leadership of the group known as the “Old Guard” or the “Cabal.”
This includes prominent names that you’ve seen many times in my reporting, like Charles Cotton, David Coy, and Bob Barr, folks who were complicit in the failings and corruption of the LaPierre regime, but who have enough general name recognition among less attentive NRA members, to make it very difficult to prevent them from being reelected to the Board. I had expected that it would probably take at least a decade to finally purge the Board of these people, but instead, they gave us all a Christmas present by resigning from the Board on their own.
Of course, this present wasn’t without cost. Once that group realized they had lost the war for control of the Board – and the NRA – they came up with a new plan. They decided to seize control of the NRA Foundation, the wealthiest of NRA’s several entities, with the apparent belief that the new NRA leadership would soon run the organization into bankruptcy and the “Old Guard” would be able to sweep in under the cape of the Foundation, and rebuild the NRA in their preferred image. It also looked like part of their plan was to help accelerate the bankruptcy prophecy by withholding grant funds from NRA programs.
The new NRA leadership refused to play that game, however, not only closing out 2025 solidly in the black, and presenting a 2026 budget that was realistic and positive – which has thus-far been exceeded in almost every respect – and most significantly, filing suit against the NRA Foundation for a variety of abuses and misuses of the NRA name.
Rather than rehashing the whole mess here, I encourage you to read my previous article discussing the lawsuit and read the lawsuit itself, which makes the NRA’s case pretty clear.
NRA Sues the NRA Foundation as Internal Power Struggle Freezes Program Funding
I think it’s important to note here that things like the Friends of NRA banquets are still ongoing and benefiting NRA programs as intended, so please don’t hesitate to continue supporting them. I would encourage folks to withhold any contributions or bequests to the NRA Foundation until this lawsuit gets cleared up, though. Those wishing to make tax-deductible contributions to NRA programs can do so through one of our other foundations. Information about such donations can be found here.
As to this year’s Director election, a total of 20 brand new or almost new Directors were elected. Several of those had run last year and were appointed to fill vacancies around the new year, meaning they were Directors for one meeting last January. Five more have only served one term, having been first elected in 2023, and one was first elected in 2022, filled a vacancy in 2025, and was elected to a full term this year. So that’s 27 of 35 that are new or fairly new to the Board.
All told, the NRA Board of Directors for the next 12 months, barring some dramatic twist, will be as follows:
Four who were first elected in the 1980s and have remained on the Board with short absences ever since: Wayne Ross -‘80, Larry Craig -‘83, Bob Brown -‘85, and Jim Porter -‘89.
Three who were first elected in the 1990s and served basically continuously since: Edie Fleeman -‘93, Bill Miller -‘97, and Don Sabba -‘99, plus Phil Journey, who served one term from ‘95 to ‘98, then wasn’t elected again until he ran with me in 2024.
There are 4 from the 2000s, 9 from the 2010s, and 64 from the 2020s, with the vast majority of those elected after 2022.
That means that over 72% of the Board has been replaced since 2019, when the LaPierre scandal first broke, with a significant majority of those remaining being strongly supportive of our reform efforts. In other words, the membership is winning. There’s more work to do, but I believe we’re on the right track and steadily making progress.
I know many of you are concerned about the size of the Board and the fact that there are still folks on the Board who vocally defended Wayne LaPierre right up to the New York jury verdict and beyond. Follow-up articles will discuss those matters and several other issues that the Board is hoping to deal with at our meeting in Houston. I want to get your thoughts on these efforts, so please stay tuned.
Meanwhile, congratulations to all who won seats in this year’s election. I look forward to getting to know, and working with you all. I encourage members to get to know these new folks and let them know what you think and what you want. You should be lobbying your NRA Directors just like you lobby Congress. We’re supposed to be working for you, so call us out and give us a push.
First Circuit Says Second Amendment Does Not Protect Buying Guns in Beckwith v. Frey
About Jeff Knox:
Jeff Knox is a dedicated political activist and the director of The Firearms Coalition, following in the footsteps of his father, Neal Knox. In 2024, Jeff was elected to the NRA Board of Directors, underscoring his lifelong commitment to protecting the Second Amendment. The Knox family has played a pivotal role in the ongoing struggle for gun rights, a legacy documented in the book Neal Knox – The Gun Rights War, authored by Jeff’s brother, Chris Knox.
Founded by Neal Knox in 1984, The Firearms Coalition is a network of individual Second Amendment activists, clubs, and civil rights organizations. The Coalition supports grassroots efforts by providing education, analysis of current issues, and a historical perspective on the gun rights movement. For more information, visit www.FirearmsCoalition.org.
