Alan Merril Gottlieb | |
|---|---|
_(cropped).jpg) Gottlieb in 2007 | |
| Born | Los Angeles, California |
| Nationality | American |
| Education | Nuclear Engineering, University of Tennessee
Institute on Comparative Political & Economic Systems, Georgetown University |
| Occupation(s) | Political Activist Author |
Alan Merril Gottlieb is an American author, conservative political activist, gun rights advocate, and businessperson. Gottlieb has published 23 books.
He was born in Los Angeles and graduated from the University of Tennessee in the summer of 1971, after a five-year course, with a degree in nuclear engineering. He was indicted by a federal grand jury on charges of filing false income tax returns in 1977 and 1978 by failing to include gross receipts of $138,000 and $260,000 those two years from Merril Associates, his political fund-raising firm[1]
Gottlieb is a defender of gun rights, and most of his 19 books are about the subject. Gottlieb is a businessman who owns several businesses whose target market is libertarian to conservative groups.
Gottlieb owns Merril Press, an "independent publisher of unusual nonfiction books by authors who know what they're writing about."[2][non-primary source needed] He is also president of four radio stations, including KITZ in Port Orchard, Washington, KGTK in Olympia, Washington, KBNP in Portland, Oregon, and KSBN in Spokane, Washington.
Gottlieb is also the Chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Founder of the Second Amendment Foundation, a board member of the American Conservative Union, and President of the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise.[citation needed]
In 1984, Gottlieb plead guilty to filing a tax return that was not true to every material mater and was sentenced to a year and a day in prison by U.S. District Court Judge John Coughenour.[3] Gottlieb's right to own firearms was restored in 1985.[4]
In 2013, Gottlieb's lobbying organization (the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms) would have backed with amendments to expand gun rights a "compromise gun registration amendment proposed by Sens. Joe Manchin and Pat Toomey."[5] The ill-fated expanded background checks bill was overwhelmingly supported by Senate Democrats and President Barack Obama at the time. The needed gun rights amendments to gain support were blocked and the bill failed.[6][7]
Gottlieb has published or self-published 23 books.
