Two days following a mass shooting at an elementary school in Uvalde, Texas, Rep. Carolyn B. Maloney (D-NY), chairwoman of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform, sent a set of questions to the five leading manufacturers of AR-style semi-automatic rifles, including Bryan County-based Daniel Defense – maker of the DDM4 V7 AR15-style rifle used by the shooter to kill 19 fourth-graders and two teachers.
The questions revolved around the sale and marketing of AR-15-style semi-automatic rifles. The deadline for answering those questions was Thursday. Despite repeated calls and emails to the Committee, however, the Savannah Morning News has been unable to confirm whether Daniel Defense met its deadline.
SMN reporters asked many of the same questions last week of Steve Reed, the vice-president of marketing for Daniel Defense. Reed responded simply with an email: "As this is an ongoing investigation we ask that you direct your questions to the proper federal authorities."
We asked no questions related to the investigation, however. Rather, SMN is more interested in how Daniel Defense and Marty Daniel, the founder and owner, conducts its business.
Credit: Courtesy of Daniel Defense website
Credit: Courtesy of Daniel Defense website
The business of making guns
Since its founding in 2001, Daniel Defense has grown into one of the leading manufacturers of semi-automatic guns and accessories. The company employees roughly 200 people, has posted 25 well-paying openings with benefits on its website, and operates out of a 380,000-square-foot manufacturing facility off I-16 in Black Creek, just less than 30 miles west of Savannah, that opened in 2009.
Credit: Steve Bisson, Savannah Morning News
Credit: Steve Bisson, Savannah Morning News
The company expanded operations in 2017, when, according to a profile in Forbes magazine, it posted $73 million in gross sales with a gross profit margin of 35%. Although government contracts to the tune of more than $30 million — including a recent $9.1 million sole source contract with the Naval Surface Warfare Center — make up a substantial portion of its revenues, 90% of Daniel Defense's sales are direct-to-consumer.
Like most local businesses, the pandemic slowed production and profits. But, within days of the federal relief Paycheck Protection Program's opening in April 2020, Daniel Defense received a loan of $3.1 million, which was quickly forgiven, even though it manufactured more than 51,000 firearms that year — a nearly 20,000 unit increase over its 2019 numbers.
It's not about the money, founder Marty Daniel explained in that 2017 Forbes profile. He said then he was "more interested in preserving our gun rights than making a dollar."
That statement is borne out by both his company's and his personal political contributions.
Credit: Steve Bisson, Savannah Morning News
Credit: Steve Bisson, Savannah Morning News
The politics of making guns
Federal government contractors as businesses are prohibited by law from making contributions or expending corporate funds in connection with federal elections, but they can contribute to political action committees (PACs) that influence federal elections. That same prohibition does not extend to individuals in a company, however.
Marty Daniel and his wife Cindy Daniel, COO of Daniel Defense, contributed upwards of $300,000 toward former President Donald Trump's re-election campaign between 2016-2020.
Daniel Defense, the company, contributed $100,000 to the Gun Owners Action Fund, a PAC founded out of an accounting firm in Tampa, Florida, following the 2020 Presidential election that backed then-Georgia senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler. The company made that contribution on Jan. 6, 2021, the day after both incumbent senators were unseated by Democrats John Ossoff and Rev. Raphael Warnock.
During the 2020-2021 election cycle, the Gun Owners Action Fund provided more than $72,000 to Republican candidates and spent nearly $60,000 campaigning against Democratic candidates.
According to Andrew Mayersohn of OpenSecrets, a national government transparency research organization, the treasurer of GOAF, Nancy Watkins, is also the treasurer for several other conservative PACs, such as Ending Spending Action Fund, which made big contributions to GOAF last cycle.
"[GOAF] also used Mentzer Media Services as a vendor, which is also used by Mitch McConnell and the Senate Leadership Fund," wrote Mayersohn in an email. "So it seems like they are in the same campaign finance ecosystem as the major mainstream conservative groups."
An ABC News article reported recently that the PAC is refunding the $100,000 contribution "at the request of the donor."
Ethics and other election disclosure forms show that during the 2022 Georgia primary that Daniel Defense contributed more than $22,000 to Gov. Brian Kemp's re-election campaign; $10,000 to the Georgia House of Representatives Trust; $7,000 to secretary of state candidate Jody Hice; and, $7,000 to Chris Carr in his re-election bid for state attorney general. Hice lost during the primary election held May 24.
Amy Paige Condon is a content coach with Savannah Morning News. You can reach her at ACondon@gannett.com.
This article originally appeared on Savannah Morning News: Congressional Committee demands answers from Daniel Defense, other gun manufacturers
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