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You can't throw a rock at the Maria Butina case without hitting David Keene, former president and current board member of the NRA. He's been right at the center of the NRA-Russia connection since the beginning. /1 
The relationship goes back to 2011, when Keene met Torshin at an NRA convention and sent this thoughtful follow-up note.
“If there is anything any of us can do to help you in your endeavors … please don’t hesitate to let us know.” /2
“If there is anything any of us can do to help you in your endeavors … please don’t hesitate to let us know.” /2
The relationship stuck, and for the next two years Torshin attended the NRA convention as Keene's VIP guest. (Torshin would go on to attend every annual NRA convention through 2016.) /3
motherjones.com/politics/2018/…
motherjones.com/politics/2018/…
In November 2013, Keene went to Moscow to speak at a convention of Torshin and Butina's group Right To Bear Arms. The group's only apparent function is to provide Russia a legitimate-looking bridge to the NRA. /4
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
At the convention, Keene and his compatriots mingled with Russian politicians… and an abundance of "leggy models". Almost like there's a pattern with Russian honeypots and Republicans. /5
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
On that note, this convention appears to be where Butina first met her future "boyfriend" Paul Erickson. /6
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
Keene and Erickson actually go back to the 1990s, when they worked as lobbyists (alongside Jack Abramoff) for the dictator Mobutu Sese Seko. (Manafort also worked for Mobutu. Damn these guys are shady.) /7
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
Back to November 2013. Keene arranged for John Bolton to praise Russia's gun control movement in a video later used by Right To Bear Arms. Two months later, the op-ed section he ran at the Washington Times printed a piece by Torshin. /8
motherjones.com/politics/2018/…
motherjones.com/politics/2018/…
Later in 2014, Butina sat alongside Keene at the NRA convention, and then went to NRA headquarters where she posed for a photo with him. /9
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
rollingstone.com/politics/polit…
In December 2015, Right To Bear Arms sponsored an NRA delegation to Moscow. Keene and other NRA luminaries met with Russian politicians "including former deputy prime minister Dmitry Rogozin who had been under U.S. sanctions since 2014." /10
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
opensecrets.org/news/2018/12/n…
The NRA delegation included the guy who ran their "Ring of Freedom" program, which cultivates deep-pocket donors. On the Russian side was the guy who ran one of Russia's deepest-pocket charity foundations. 🤔. /11
vanityfair.com/news/2018/06/t…
vanityfair.com/news/2018/06/t…
In 2017, Keene showed up in a bizarre story with Butina and Erickson. Butina claimed she could arrange the sale of an absurdly large quantity of Russian jet fuel. Keene and his wife tried to find a buyer, after being offered a $1 million finder's fee. /12
nytimes.com/2018/09/02/us/…
nytimes.com/2018/09/02/us/…
Some articles paint Keene as a useful idiot who got played by Torshin. His work for Mobuto says otherwise. None of these people were naive. They're grown men who broke a lot of laws and helped a like-minded dictator install a puppet president. /13
Given Keene’s role here, I honestly don’t understand how he’s managed to stay relatively out of the spotlight. Even in the articles above, he’s mostly been treated like part of the supporting cast. Hopefully an indictment or two will come along and change that. /14
One last note. Keene and the NRA are more proof that Trump-Russia isn’t just about one orange-skinned con man. A lot of prominent culture war conservatives had a hand in this. /15
Kline Preston, the man who introduced Keene to Torshin, put it like this: “The value system of Southern Christians and the value system of Russians are very much in line.” And they’re more than happy to work with Russia to make America white again. /16
Keene has been a member of the far-right Council for National Policy. Other CNP members with Trump ties: Steve Bannon, Kellyanne Conway, David Bossie, Jay Sekulow, Chris Ruddy, and Jerome Corsi (and Betsy DeVos and Erik Prince’s mom and DeVos’ FIL). And…
