in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election, there was all of a sudden a weird russian twist in u.s. gun politics. i spelled out maria butina s plea agreement in december 2015 in the middle of the presidential campaign right before the iowa caucuses, a former nra president and a future nra president and a whole delegation of nra officials and members all got an all-expenses paid trip to moscow. it was organized by the right to bear arms, purportedly a gun rights group founded by a senior member of vladimir putin s political party. the head of that group is a deputy governor of the russian bank. a close ally of vladimir putin. and torchin s group, the rights to bear arms group has always been kind of a head scratcher. because putin and his party don t actually support gun rights in russia.
the nra and its politics. it s a term that seems literally foreign. in the lead-up to the 2016 presidential election, there was all of the sudden a weird russian twist in u.s. gun politics. a spelled out maria butina s plea agreement in december 2015 in the middle of the presidential campaign right before the iowa caucuses, a former nra president and a future nra president and a whole delegation of fnra officials an members all got an all-expenses paid trip to moscow. it was organized by the right to bear arms, purportedly a gun rights group founded by a senior member of vladimir putin s political party. a head of that is a deputy governor of the russian bank. he is a close ally of vladimir putin. and torsian s group, the rights to bear arms group has always been kind of a head scratcher. because putin and his party don t actually support gun
member who was her maybe boyfriend who appears to have been her entree into this world. we ve had reports from the daily beast several days ago that he has received a target letter that federal prosecutors are considering charging him as a foreign agent, as an agent of the russian government operating in this country. will the erickson case finally become clear if maria butina is pleading and cooperating? then there is the question of whether her plea will ultimately give us a window into what freaking happened with the nra in the middle of this election interference scandal. could the resolution of maria butina s case finally give us a window into what has been going on here? if the fbi has been investigating, among other things, the possibility that the nra was used as a large scale conduit for russian money into the effort to elect president trump president, will the maria boutros boutros-ghali butina case give us insight? a reporter who has been tracking that joins us next.