Fast and Furious getting Ugly for Administration

[HonestChieffan]

Two stories.....this is an ugly baby that wont go away.

http://thehill.com/homenews/news/171073-republicans-want-records-from-justice-officials-about-gun-operation

(The Hill) — Republican lawmakers have requested correspondence records, including emails and handwritten notes, from a dozen senior Justice Department officials who may have been involved in a controversial gun-tracking operation.

The Hill has obtained a letter sent from Sen. Chuck Grassley (Iowa) and Rep. Darrell Issa (Calif.) to Attorney General Eric Holder this week in which they ask for communication records from 12 senior officials with the Department of Justice (DOJ), including James Cole, the recently confirmed Deputy Attorney General.

Grassley, the ranking member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Issa, the chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, are investigating the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ (ATF) botched operation “Fast and Furious,” which sold thousands of weapons to known and suspected straw purchasers for Mexican drug cartels.

The move comes in connection with a separate letter sent by the lawmakers to Holder on Monday asking for records of a shared drive, which they say was provided to the computers of ATF officials and could jeopardize their investigation.

The drive contained documents relating to the Fast and Furious operation that the DOJ has given to the committee and possibly documents that it has not yet handed over, their letter states.

“Allowing witnesses access to such documents could taint their testimony by allowing them to tailor their responses to what they think the committees already know,” the lawmakers wrote.

http://dailycaller.com/2011/07/12/issa-grassley-name-12-senior-justice-officials-in-fast-and-furious-letter/#ixzz1RwfPcYyq

House oversight committee chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, California Republican, and Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican, ripped Attorney General Eric Holder again in another Monday letter.

The top Republicans investigating the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) Operation Fast and Furious also blasted Holder for allegations that he allowed his Justice Department to skew potential witnesses by prepping them with access to background information.

In this new letter, Issa and Grassley name 12 senior Justice Department political officials they believe may have been involved in the decision which allowed guns into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. They asked Holder to provide all records relating to communications between those 12 individuals regarding Operation Fast and Furious.

“As our investigation into Operation Fast and Furious has progressed, we have learned that senior officials at the Department of Justice (DOJ), including Senate-confirmed political appointees, were unquestionably aware of the implementation of this reckless program,” Grassley and Issa wrote to Holder. “Therefore it is necessary to review communications between and among these senior officials.”

Obama administration officials Issa and Grassley named in their letter were:

–Former Deputy Attorney General David Ogden
–Deputy Attorney General James Cole
–Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer
–Deputy Assistant Attorney General Kenneth Blanco
–Deputy Assistant Attorney General Jason Weinstein
–Deputy Assistant Attorney General John Keeney
–Associate Deputy Attorney General Matt Axelrod
–Former Associate Deputy Attorney General Ed Siskel
–Gary Grindler in the Office of the Attorney General
–Brad Smith, in the office of the Deputy Attorney General
–Kevin Carwile, section chief of the Capital Case Unit
–Joseph Cooley, in the Criminal Fraud Section
The records Issa and Grassley are requesting include emails, memos, briefing papers and handwritten notes. They also requested any records concerning any large weapons trafficking cases within ATF or in Phoenix. The deadline they gave Holder is July 18 at noon. (Grassley, Issa slam Holder again: Are you skewing witnesses?)

Operation Fast and Furious and Project Gunrunner were ATF programs the administration aimed at stopping guns from getting into the hands of criminals in Mexico.

With Operation Fast and Furious, Obama administration officials permitted “straw purchasers” to buy guns and then to sell them to Mexican drug cartels with the goal of tracking the flow of arms to determine how the market functioned. The program backfired with criminals ending up getting guns.

Most egregiously, two U.S. Border Patrol agents were killed by drug cartels using Operation Fast and Furious guns.



Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2011/07/12/issa-grassley-name-12-senior-justice-officials-in-fast-and-furious-letter/#ixzz1RwfPcYyq

[HonestChieffan]

Just in case you wonder...

(CNN) — Federal agents can’t account for more than 1,400 guns after a widely criticized operation aimed at tracing the flow of weapons to Mexican drug gangs, sources with knowledge of the investigation tell CNN.

Of 2,020 guns involved in the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives probe dubbed “Operation Fast and Furious,” 363 have been recovered in the United States and 227 have been recovered in Mexico. That leaves 1,430 guns unaccounted for, the sources said.

The ATF operation was intended to build cases against Mexican drug cartels by allowing firearms to go from the United States into Mexico. The hope was by tracing the guns in Mexico, agents would be able to determine the structure of various cartels and then bring them down.

The problem was that once the guns were allowed to “walk,” there was no way to recover them until they turned up at crime scenes. The operation has been widely criticized in Congress, with the chairman of a House committee that investigated the issue calling it “felony stupid.”

Rene Jaquez, the ATF’s former attache in Mexico City, told CNN the operation never should have happened.

“Guns traditionally are just not allowed to leave the undercover operation for fear that it will enter into the criminal element and then be subsequently used in a crime at a later date,” Jaquez said.

http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/07/12/atf.guns/index.html

[petegz28]

SSSSSHHHHHH

[HonestChieffan]

Oh my.....Holders guys did a second op similar? Say it aint so.....


(Daily Caller) — Republican lawmakers are alleging that Operation Fast and Furious may have had a twin in Tampa: Operation Castaway.

The new revelations have come to light as Florida Republican Rep. Gus Bilrakis fired off a letter to Attorney General Eric Holder and acting ATF Director Ken Melson asking them for answers about the newly discovered program.

“In recent days, it has come to light that the ATF and DOJ have participated in the act of ‘gun walking’ beyond the acts conducted within the scope of ‘Operation Fast and Furious,’” Bilrakis wrote to Holder and Melson.

“Recent reports have suggested that Project Gunrunner may not have been limited to weapons trafficking to Mexico and that similar programs included the possible trafficking of arms to criminal gangs in Honduras with the knowledge of the ATF’s Tampa Field Division and the Department of Justice’s Middle District of Florida through an operation known as ‘Operation Castaway,’” the letter read.


http://dailycaller.com/2011/07/13/did-operation-fast-and-furious-have-a-tampa-twin-operation-castaway/

[HonestChieffan]

Fast And Furious Scandal: A Watergate For Obama?

Posted 07/13/2011 06:23 PM ET


Border: A 2-year-old video shows a high Justice official saying "the president has directed us," including the attorney general, to speed up Project Gunrunner and the offshoot that got a border agent killed.

This tape has no 18-minute gap, and while it does not feature the president himself, the March 24, 2009, video may rival the tape that turned a "third-rate burglary" into a presidential resignation. No one died at Watergate. Agent Brian Terry lost his life in the administration's obsessive pursuit of gun control.

In addition to Agent Terry, Immigration Customs Enforcement Agent Jaime Zapata was also killed in a separate incident by a weapon allowed to "walk" into Mexico from the U.S. as part of the administration's third-rate alleged attempt to track and catch gun traffickers.

The video shows Deputy Attorney General David Ogden, who would resign nine months later after less than a year's service, telling reporters at a Department of Justice briefing of major policy initiatives to fight the Mexican drug cartels.

"The president has directed us to take action to fight these cartels," Ogden begins, "and Attorney General Holder and I are taking several new and aggressive steps as part of the administration's comprehensive plan."

At the president's direction, Ogden said, the administration's plan included DOJ's Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives "increasing its efforts by adding 37 new employees in three new offices, using $10 million in Recovery Act funds and redeploying 100 personnel to the Southwest border in the next 45 days to fortify its Project Gunrunner," of which Operation Fast and Furious would be a part.

As we have noted, Attorney General Eric Holder himself gave a speech to Mexican authorities in Cuernavaca, Mexico, on April 2, 2009, taking credit for Gunrunner as well as Fast and Furious for himself and the Obama administration.

Holder told the audience: "Last week, our administration launched a major new effort to break the backs of the cartels. My department is committing 100 new ATF personnel to the Southwest border in the next 100 days to supplement our ongoing Project Gunrunner."


The administration's animus towards private gun ownership and the Second Amendment surfaced during the 2008 campaign, when President Obama spoke of bitter Pennsylvania townsfolk clinging to their guns. The Chicago Tribune noted that candidate Obama thought the District of Columbia's total gun ban was constitutional, an opinion with which the U.S. Supreme Court disagreed in its Heller decision.
Shortly after taking office, both Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and AG Holder made a point of putting forth what we and others have called "the 90% lie" at the same time the administration was advocating "sensible restrictions" on gun ownership.

The effort included releasing a report claiming that 90% of the weapons used by the Mexican drug cartels were purchased from or originated from the U.S. The actual number was found to be closer to 8%. But it perpetuated the myth that "easy access" to guns cause crime.

Last Thursday, some six months after the Tucson shootings that killed six and wounded 13, including Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the White House announced it was working on "common-sense measures" to improve public safety.

"The process is well under way at the Department of Justice," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney announced.

Of course, this is the same DOJ that pushed Gunrunner and Fast and Furious. Common sense has nothing to do with it. It is part of the administration's agenda to push gun control and chip away at our Second Amendment rights.

After funneling some 2,500 guns to criminals and drug lords, the DOJ announced it is requiring gun stores in Arizona, California, Texas and New Mexico to report individual purchases of multiple rifles of greater than .22 caliber by law-abiding American citizens to the ATF because — get this — such guns are "frequently recovered at violent crime scenes near the Southwest border."

Really? Does that include the administration-supplied weapons that killed Brian Terry and Jaime Zapata? Where's the public apology for their deaths? "Brian Terry's loss was preventable," said Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chair of the House Oversight and Government Affairs Committee investigating this operation. "It was regrettable and preventable."

And now the trail leads directly into the Oval Office.


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