The official creed of the Shriners International organization is to “care for the less fortunate, especially children…” Their single philanthropic mission is Shriners Children’s, a network of 13 pediatric hospitals and other medical clinics and affiliations established over more than a century. In that time, the organization claims to have aided more than 1.5 million children.

For the last few decades, though, Shriners across the country have institutionalized local gun raffles to keep its chapters afloat amid declining membership and evidence of ethical and financial improprieties at the highest levels of its leadership. In 2024, dozens of its 177 U.S.-based chapters hosted a raffle — some have been holding them for decades, others started more recently — sometimes livestreaming the events to get participation at home. 

Considering how many young people are killed or injured by firearms in the U.S. every year — guns are the leading cause of death among children ages 1 to 17 — the lucrative raffles mark an odd turn, and underscore a cultural windfall. Each raffle can put more than 100 guns in the hands of its winners, and raise enough funds for a chapter to operate for another year. 

Though tax law and the organization’s own bylaws state the gun raffles should in no way be associated with the temple’s philanthropy, it’s often hard to tell where the line is between individual chapter and organizational mission.

From The Trace

What to Know Today 

In much of America, the response to school shootings has been to put more guns in schools, by way of armed security. But as The Trace has reported, there’s limited evidence that armed guards deter gun violence and mass shootings on campuses. New research casts further doubt about their contribution to school safety. [Undark]

The tightly contested race for Democratic U.S. Representative Jared Golden’s seat in Congress will be determined through a ranked-choice count, Maine election officials announced on Thursday, after neither the incumbent nor his GOP challenger, Austin Theriault, reached the 50 percent threshold required by the state to win. Gun policy was a major issue in the race for the seat: After the mass shooting in Lewiston last year, Golden apologized for previously voting against gun reform and reversed his opposition to a ban on assault weapons; his opponent accused him of “flip-flopping” his position on firearms. [News Center Maine/Associated Press] 

Far-right extremists, including members of pro-gun, anti-government militias and white nationalists, see Donald Trump’s presidential victory as an opportunity to advance their agenda and potentially aid their efforts to dismantle democratic institutions, according to messages on Telegram and social media channels. Experts on extremism say it’s an ominous sign. [The Washington Post] 

Police in Kenosha, Wisconsin, arrested a 13-year-old who allegedly tried to enter an elementary school with a suspicious backpack, before school staff questioned him in a secure entryway. The city’s police chief said that an initial investigation showed that the teen had done internet searches about school shootings; he is accused of making terroristic threats. During a search of his home, detectives found several replica guns, but no real firearms. “This is something that should have been known,” the chief said after the arrest. “All the red flags were there.” [Wisconsin Public Radio/CBS] 

When Louisiana legislators passed a bill lowering the age at which the justice system must treat defendants as adults from 18 to 17, it was ostensibly an effort to counter an epidemic of teen violence, including gun crimes. But as Verite News and ProPublica reported last month, the vast majority of 17-year-olds arrested in the state’s three largest parishes weren’t accused of violent crimes. Now, state lawmakers are quietly moving legislation that would remove limitations on the number of crimes for which 14-, 15-, and 16-year-olds could be sent to adult prisons. [Louisiana Illuminator] 

Via The Weekly Briefing newsletter: Donald Trump’s presidential victory could prompt the Justice Department to change or reverse its positions in lawsuits across the legal system. The change in power could affect the outcome of Garland v. VanDerStok, a Supreme Court case over the Biden administration’s effective ban on ghost guns. [Roll Call]

Data Point

$557 billion — the estimated amount that gun violence in the U.S. cost the economy in 2022. [BMJ] 

Non Sequitur

This story, published in October, is more closely related to our beat than what usually goes in this section. But it is a beautiful piece, and one that offers a true change of pace.

American Boys: “Sometime during my early years in Minneapolis, I heard about a traveling club basketball team from Cedar-Riverside, a group of high school–aged Somali kids coached by a local teacher, who also happened to be a white lady from Wisconsin (and if there is a cultural marker in Minnesota more charged than Somali, it is Wisconsinite). … Eventually, I approached the coach with an idea: What if I embedded with the Cedar-Riverside Warriors for a season in a journalistic capacity? The team’s story was an essential one, I argued — an American story, a Somali story, a narrative of migration and integration, xenophobia and community, sports and brotherhood. Coach looked me up and down. Said she’d think about it.” [The Believer]

Sunny Sone
Sunny is in charge of our newsletters, leading the growth of existing products and dreaming up new ones. They previously worked as a copy editor at The Intercept and as digital editor for the Texas Observer, and co-published a web-only magazine under the Brick House media cooperative. Sunny has covered topics ranging from the Texas funeral industry to the life of visionary composer Pauline Oliveros. They hold a degree in journalism from the University of Texas at Austin.