Rep. Darrell Issa released three documents today. One document is a wiretap authorized by Asst. Attorney General Lanny Breuer in Operation Fast and Furious. The wiretap was authorized in early 2010.
Here are links to stories on it by Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News and Matthew Boyle in The Daily Caller. I am heading out the door to a meeting and will post more later this evening.
Cam Edwards interviewed Tom Gresham of GunTalk on the floor of the NRA Annual Meeting. Among other things, they discussed Project Gunwalker. That is in the latter half of the video.
No, I’m not talking about women’s rights, suffragettes, or even cigarettes – though I am from North Carolina. I’m actually talking about bloggers and gun bloggers in particular.
Bloggers are considered by the media to be the crazy cousins in the attic obsessed with their Shih-Tzu’s or the Royal Wedding. (Oh, wait, it is the mainstream media that was obsessed with that last thing.) Still, it can be truthfully said that bloggers are given little respect by the mainstrain media.
At 10am or so this morning, NRA Executive VP Wayne LaPierre is expected to call on U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder to resign, in part, due to the fallout from Operation Fast and Furious (aka Project Gunwalker).
Without two gun bloggers – David Codrea of WarOnGuns/Gun Rights Examiner and Mike Vanderboegh of Sipsey Street Irregulars – we would not have known of this sordid affair. When they broke the story last December that the weapons found at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry were linked to an ATF operation, it was ignored by the mainstream media. There were no headlines in the Washington Post who had been doing a whole series of feature stories on firearms and crime. There was nothing in the New York Times though their editorial page had been active in pushing for “common-sense” gun control. It was ignored by the networks.
Fast forward to the present. All three major gun rights organizations are on board. Congressional investigators from the offices of Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Chuck Grassley are in Arizona probing the Phoenix Field Division for answers. Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News has done a number of on-camera and on-record reports with ATF whistle-blowers such as Senior Agent John Dodson and former ATF Attache to Mexico Darren Gil (among others). Contempt of Congress proceedings may be forthcoming from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee for the failure of ATF Acting Director Kenneth Melson to respond to a subpoena from the committee.
I’m sure David and Mike had hopes in those cold gray days of December and January that Project Gunwalker would been seen for what it is. However, I think even they at times would have said the chances were somewhat slim. So when Wayne LaPierre speaks at the Members Meeting this morning and calls for Holder to resign, I will be thinking of them and saying to myself “You’ve come a long way, baby.”
Actually, I’m not sure I’d call them visitors and I definitely know that they aren’t that welcome – at least by ATF. The “they” are House and Senate investigators who have converged on Arizona in the course of their investigation into Operation Fast and Furious (aka Project Gunwalker).
Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News reports that:
CBS News has learned that House and Senate investigators have descended upon Arizona for their probe into the so-called “Gunwalker” scandal. They’re gathering interviews from witnesses, including ATF insiders and area gun shop owners. Sources tell CBS News the congressional investigators are frustrated by what they view as across-the-board stonewalling by government agencies which have refused to provide information in the investigation. Government officials have said they won’t provide information while their own investigations are ongoing.
“They’re investigating themselves,” says one source on Capitol Hill, “and then claiming the open investigations preclude them from giving Congress information it needs for independent oversight. It’s highly improper.”
Attkisson’s report also identifies the Assistant U.S. Attorney who advised Operation Fast and Furious as AUSA Emory Hurley. Mr. Hurley’s boss U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke was the long-time chief of staff for Secretary of Homeland Security Janet Napolitano. As a reminder, one should not forget that Napolitano was the Governor of Arizona until she assumed the DHS post in 2009.
In a related development, Attkisson reports that George Gillett continues to spill the beans to Sen. Charles Grassley’s staff. As I emphasized earlier in the month, this is the equivalent of a Nixon White House insider giving the goods to Sen. Sam Ervin’s Watergate investigation.
Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT) is a member of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. He appeared on FoxNews on Friday to discuss the failure of ATF to respond to the subpoena issued by the Committee.
Watch the latest video at video.foxnews.com
Earlier in the month I speculated about the ATF, Project Gunrunner, and GPS tracking chips. My thoughts on the subject were spurred by comments made by Michael Bane in his Down Range Radio podcast.
Today, while looking for reaction to the threat of a Contempt of Congress cititation made by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA), I came across an article in The Daily Caller which gave a bare-bones outline of Project Gunrunner. The article by Michael Boyle was entitled What we know about Project Gunrunner. Contained in the article was this about its origins:
The project began during the Bush administration in Laredo, Texas, in 2005 as a trial, morphing into a national program in 2006. The guns were sold and tracked electronically, giving law enforcement agents valuable intelligence on where the weapons went and who had them.
During the Bush years, no guns were allowed to cross the border into Mexico. When President Obama took office in 2009, things changed. Obama’s ATF continued Project Gunrunner, but made a crucial decision to allow guns to be “walked” into Mexico, eventually ending up in the hands of Mexican drug cartels.
If this article is indeed correct about firearms being electronically tagged and tracked as far back as 2005 during the Bush Administration, then a number of questions immediately come to mind.
First, if the guns sold out of Laredo in 2005 were electronically tagged and tracked, did ATF continue this method of electronically tagging and tracking the firearms sold later in Project Gunrunner?
Second, if they stopped the electronic tracking, this leads to the question why? Was it too expensive, too unreliable, or what? Did someone in the Obama Administration make the decision to discontinue the electronic tagging and tracking? Again, why?
Third, if the ATF did continue electronically tagging and tracking the straw purchases of firearms, then how did they lose track of these guns and let them cross the border into Mexico? It didn’t happen during the Bush Administration (according the Daily Caller) so who made the conscious decision to allow tagged guns to cross the border.
Finally, if the guns were still tagged electronically, who was responsible for tracking them once they crossed the border into Mexico?
I don’t know the answers to any of these questions nor do I have some inside source feeding me leaks. I’m just going on what was said was done during the Bush Administration by The Daily Caller and from what I’ve seen and read happened in the period since. It raises questions that should be answered in any investigation of Project Gunrunner or Operation Fast and Furious.
The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms issued this press release yesterday evening regarding the continued refusal of ATF to release documents related to Operation Fast and Furious.
The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms today said Kenneth E. Melson, acting director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, should resign or be fired for continued stonewalling on “Project Gunrunner,” the controversial operation that allegedly allowed thousands of guns to be funneled across the border into Mexico.
Congressman Darrell Issa today threatened Melson with contempt for failing to produce documents that Issa’s House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform subpoenaed on March 31. Melson had until April 13 to provide the documents, and the deadline passed without any response.
“Melson’s continued stonewalling on the Project Gunrunner investigation is intolerable,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb. “It appears obvious that he has no intention of cooperating with Congress on this serious matter. He should resign or be fired, and he should be replaced by a professional who will work quickly to clean up the ATF, and that starts with providing all Project Gunrunner documents to Congress.”
Rep. Issa sent a letter to Melson earlier today, chastising him for not complying with the subpoena. In that letter, Issa also complained that Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich’s responses on behalf of the ATF have been “largely unhelpful.”
“It appears that Mr. Weich is running interference for Melson and the ATF officials who controlled Gunrunner and its adjunct, Operation Fast-and-Furious,” Gottlieb said. “The only conclusion one can draw from this is that Attorney General Eric Holder’s Justice Department is fully engaged in this smoke and mirrors sham.”
“Obama administration officials evidently believe this scandal will just go away if they ignore it,” he continued. “Congressman Issa’s committee has every right to demand documents and the authority to review them. Barack Obama promised the most transparent administration in history, and this cover up proves his rhetoric was as empty as the suit he is wearing.”
“If Melson, and for that matter, Weich, cannot deliver today,” Gottlieb concluded, “they should both clean out their desks tomorrow.”
Rep. Darrell Issa, Chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, is not a happy man. He is not happy because the Department of Justice and the Acting Director of ATF, Kenneth Melson, are continuing to blow off the requests for documents related to Operation Fast and Furious (aka Project Gunwalker). This is in the face of a supoena requesting documents issued by the Committee.
Rep. Issa is so unhappy that he is threatening to have Melson cited for Contempt of Congress according to a letter released this morning. I have embedded the letter below. In the letter, Issa states that absent a claim of executive privilege ATF and DOJ have no authority to withhold the documents requested by Issa’s committee. Moreover, internal DOJ policies do not suffice as a reason to withhold documents and impede Congress in its constitutional authority.
A year ago this could not have happened. The Republicans did not have a majority in the House of Representatives and there is no way that Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA) would have threatened to jack up the head of ATF. Elections most certainly do have consequences.
4-20-11 Melson Follow Up Letter
H/T David Codrea and Mike Vanderboegh
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Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) has fired another salvo at Attorney General Eric Holder and the Justice Department over Operation Fast and Furious (aka Project Gunwalker). In his latest letter, Grassley releases e-mails sent by an unnamed FFL in Arizona to ATF Group VII Supervisor David Voth along with Voth’s replies. They show that at least one cooperating gun dealer was quite concerned that these straw purchases would end up in Mexico.
Sharyl Attkisson of CBS News reports that Rep. Darrell Issa and Sen. Grassley are sharing information received from the Justice Department. However, as she notes, the response by DOJ hasn’t been very forthcoming.
So far, Grassley and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), who is also investigating the gunwalking scandal, say they have received little to no meaningful response to their document and information requests from ATF and the Department of Justice. Earlier this week when the Justice Department turned over selected materials to Rep. Issa’s staff, sources say Grassley’s staff were now allowed entry or access to the same materials.
Grassley notes in his letter that the Justice Department has not provided his office or staff with even one page of the requested documents. He goes on to say that he hasn’t requested that Sen. Pat Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, issue a supoena or document request because “any such request would be unnecessary and duplicative of the process on the House side.”
The previous responses by the Justice Department from Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich brought this from Sen. Grassley.
The Department’s failure to cooperate with my requests is especially troubling in light of the February 4, 2011, reply to my initial letter. In that reply, the Justice Department took the position that those allegations were “false” and specifically denied “that ATF ‘sanctioned’ or otherwise knowingly allowed the sale of assault weapons” to straw purchasers. The letter further claimed that “ATF makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to Mexico.”
I already provided evidence contradicting that denial in my February 9 and March 3 letters. In addition, attached you will find further documentation undermining the Department’s assertion. Specifically, the documents are emails between ATF officials and a Federal Firearms Licensee (FFL) in Arizona. These emails demonstrate that ATF instructed gun dealers to engage in suspicious sales despite the dealers’ concerns. The emails refer to meetings between the FFL and the U.S. Attorney’s office to address the concerns being raised by the FFL.
Grassley goes on to say that the Justice Department’s claim that they didn’t authorize or allow the sale of firearms to straw buyers is simply not believable. He then goes on to put Holder on the spot by asking the two following questions. He requests a response by April 20th.
1. Do you stand by the assertion in the Department’s reply that the ATF whistleblower allegations are “false” and specifically that ATF did not sanction or otherwise knowingly allow the sale of assault weapons to straw purchasers? If so, please explain why in light of the mounting evidence to the contrary.
2. Will you commit to providing the Senate Judiciary Committee with documents, or access to documents, simultaneously with the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform? If not, please explain why not.
CBS News has video of Grassley discussing his letter and the email on the floor of the Senate.
The emails that have been released definitely show that the FFL was concerned about where these firearms went. He had friends who were U.S. Border Patrol agents and didn’t want them to be harmed by his cooperation with ATF. Beyond just the emails, Grassley’s staff has also interviewed the FFL. They are definitely worth reading to see how the dealers were “played” by ATF in the course of their so-called investigation.
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