This morning, Erick Erickson writes, “this week, RedState broke the story of the “gag order” the NRA issued to members of its Board on the Kagan nomination.”

Erick wrote, “internal Senate emails confirmed by NRA Board Members show that the National Rifle Association’s management team has explicitly and directly told the NRA’s board they are prohibited from testifying about second amendment issues during the Elena Kagan confirmation hearings… The gag order on board members is not limited to providing testimony, but it prohibits board members from coming out against Kagan in their individual capacity.”

The NRA-ILA Executive Director Chris Cox calls this charge BS.

This claim shows complete ignorance of how the NRA operates. NRA staff, including everyone (myself included) at the NRA Institute for Legislative Action, work for the NRA Executive Vice President, who in turn works for the NRA board, which in turn is elected by NRA’s voting members.Under the NRA by-laws, NRA-ILA has “sole responsibility to administer the legislative, legal, informational and fund raising activities of the Association relating to the defense or furtherance of the right to keep and bear arms, in accordance with the objectives and policies established by the Board of Directors.”
… When Justice John Paul Stevens announced his retirement in April, I sent an e-mail to NRA board members and staff stating that with the critical case of McDonald v. Chicago still pending before the Court, “it is very important that NRA not comment on Justice Stevens nor engage in speculation on potential successors.”Similarly, when the President nominated Solicitor General Kagan to the Court in May, I sent a message to the NRA Board pointing out her lack of a judicial record; noting that NRA-ILA was reviewing all available information; and stating that “it is important that we all refrain from commenting until we know more about Kagan’s views regarding the Second Amendment.” Again, I referenced the fact that NRA has a case pending before the Court.
This is exactly the approach the NRA took last year when we opposed the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor. Early in the process, we expressed our serious concerns about her record. We announced our opposition after her confirmation hearings ended without evidence that she would properly respect our fundamental, individual right to keep and bear arms and apply it to the states. Her dissenting vote in McDonald v. Chicago confirmed that our position was correct.

Put another way, you try telling Ted Nugent that he’s under a “gag order” and can’t express opposition to Kagan, and see how well that goes.

Other members of the board, like the president of the New York State Rifle and Pistol Association are saying they never heard any gag order, either: “Friends; those of you close to me should know by now that telling me I can’t speak up on an issue of vital importance to the 2nd Amendment is going to get you into a war.”

Matt Lewis looked at this, and suspected this was a matter of interpreting Cox’s messages:

Of three NRA board members I contacted, only one confirmed “explicitly and directly” receiving any sort of directive that could be interpreted as a “gag order” regarding Kagan. But all three sources confirmed that NRA board members actively opposed to Sotomayor’s confirmation have been severely chastised “to the degree that they would not speak out against Kagan” (as one board member – who requested anonymity – told me).Because most members of the NRA’s board of directors are also heavily involved in numerous other conservative organizations, it seems unusual the NRA would expect board members to remain silent on the Kagan nomination (in fact, many have already spoken out). More likely, the NRA, which is heavily involved in lobbying in Washington, does not want board members representing themselves as speaking for the organization without its approval. And it’s reasonable to assume that testifying in a Senate hearing against Kagan would be frowned upon more than simply writing a column that does not mention any affiliation with the gun group.

Since then I’ve heard from one of the board members, who characterizes the warning from