A Colorado Springs man has just become the National Rifle Association’s youngest board member, and he’s gunning to bring a fresh perspective to leadership.

Huey Laugesen, 25, was elected to the board of directors for a one-year term, according to preliminary results from the NRA’s 2026 mail-in ballot election.

According to his resume Laugesen, the executive director of the NRA’s Colorado State Shooting Association, has led efforts across the state to advocate for Second Amendment rights through litigation, legislative engagement and electoral strategy. The resume says he played an “important role” in pushing back against Colorado’s attempts to impose assault weapon bans in 2023 and 2024.

“Thank you to all of the NRA members who have entrusted me with your votes. I do not take that lightly, and I do not intend to let you down,” Laugesen said in a telephone interview with The Gazette.

Laugesen said most infringements of the Second Amendment occur at the state level, and that he believes part of that solution is improving outreach among young people, noting that the association is still in the “stone age” when it comes to technology.

“It’s great for the old guys who are used to interacting with organizations via mail, but they don’t do well in the digital space, and that is where the young people are.”

Laugesen, the son of former Gazette editorial page editor Wayne Laugesen, is looking to overhaul the association’s approach to social media by integrating more digital content, such as internet memes, onto the NRA’s platforms.

Another way he aims to bridge the gap for young people is by advocating for things he says the Second Amendment should protect.

“We would like to see the NRA get a lot more aggressive in defending all hardware that the Second Amendment applies to,” he said, including the use of suppressors, bump stocks, machine guns, forced reset triggers and other military-grade modifications and weapons.