Both Sides on Assault Gun Issue Spent Big to Sway State Legislators

The National Rifle Assn., which has led the fight against bills to ban military-style assault weapons, reported Friday that it spent $183,000 to lobby the Legislature during the first three months of this year.

But the lobbying expenditure report, filed with Secretary of State March Fong Eu, contained obvious major inaccuracies. A top NRA executive blamed “miscommunication” for the errors and said a corrected version will be filed swiftly.

The report, for example, showed no lobbying activity at all on the Legislature’s two bills to outlaw about 60 semiautomatic assault firearms--despite the fact that the organization led a sustained all-out attack on those bills. In another instance, the NRA reported attempting to influence action on three dozen bills that do not exist.

“I think this is a major clerical error on our part,” said Wayne LaPierre, executive director of the Washington-based organization’s lobbying department and the man who signed the report. He said, however, that the expenditure totals seemed accurate.

Meanwhile, the NRA’s chief antagonist, Handgun Control Inc. and its California affiliate, Californians Against Handgun Violence, reported spending $135,000 to lobby in favor of the assault gun ban measures by Assemblyman Mike Roos (D-Los Angeles) and Senate President Pro Tem David A. Roberti (D-Los Angeles).

The hefty expenditures by both sides, spanning Jan. 1 to March 31, reflect the fierce battle between the two opposing interests over gun control, always an emotionally charged issue in California.

The Roberti bill is awaiting the signature of Gov. George Deukmejian, who has promised to sign it. However, his signature is contingent upon him also receiving a second bill containing additional provisions that he wants. The second bill, authored by Roos, abruptly stalled in the Assembly on Thursday when Speaker Willie Brown (D-San Francisco) expressed doubts about the toughness of its penalties.

Both the NRA and Handgun Control, in addition to seeking to influence legislators in Sacramento, took their campaigns out of the capital arena and made statewide appeals to California citizens through newspaper and broadcast advertisements. Although not uncommon, such indirect lobbying techniques are very expensive and demonstrate the importance placed on the issue by the two rival groups.

The NRA reported paying its staff lobbyist, David A. Marshall, $20,102 during the three-month period. He since has been replaced and reassigned to other states.

Handgun Control said it paid the lobbying firm of Rose & Kindel $5,000.

Employers of lobbyists are required to report the broad outlines of how lobbying funds are spent but do not have to provide details. Both NRA spokeswoman Pam Pryor and Luis Tolley, an official of Handgun Control and its California affiliate, said most of their funds were spent on paid advertising.

Handgun Control expenses, Tolley said, included $4,000 to transport two busloads of people from the South Central Organizing Committee in Los Angeles to Sacramento to lobby in favor of the Roberti and Roos bills.

He said an additional $10,000 was paid to a company to make phone calls to Californians to support the legislation and $2,000 went to the California Teachers Assn. to finance the production of lapel buttons.

Besides the NRA, other opponents of the bills and their lobbying expenditures included the California Rifle and Pistol Assn., an affiliate of the NRA, $20,216; Gun Owners of California, $8,750, and the California Sportsmen’s Lobby, $8,982.

Officials of the NRA appeared to be unaware of the mistakes in their lobbying report until asked about the discrepancies by a reporter.

In addition to failing to mention the Roberti and Roos bills and listing bills that do not exist, the report mistakenly listed a dozen bills in which the NRA has no interest. They ranged from highway snow removal to labeling the fat and cholesterol content of food.

The NRA’s LaPierre said the erroneous listings were “a result of miscommunication. Our entire focus of lobbying has been around (the Roberti-Roos bills) as well as an array of other gun bills.