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Bush's ATF Director Rebuffs Right Wing's Fast And Furious Theory

September 02, 2011 3:52 pm ET by Matt Gertz

For months, the right-wing media has been desperately trying to tie the ATF's failed Fast and Furious operation to the upper reaches of the Justice Department and the White House, claiming that President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder must have known the flawed techniques used by the ATF despite their denials.

The right-wing media claimed that the stimulus funded the operation; that wasn't true. They claimed that Attorney General Holder "took credit" for Fast and Furious in a speech; that wasn't true either. They've even claimed, absent any evidence whatsoever, that the Obama administration deliberately set up the operation to arm Mexican drug cartels in order to justify increased gun control.

But in an appearance today on Fox News, Michael Sullivan, acting director of the ATF under President Bush, pushed back against such claims, saying that Operation Fast and Furious was "well within the rights of the director [of ATF] to approve or reject," and that he would be "surprised" to learn that "authorities outside the ATF" would have known the details of a specific firearms trafficking operation.

KELLY WRIGHT (ANCHOR): The President says he knew nothing about the operation, but the Justice Department has been slow in responding. Do you think this will lead all the way to the White House being involved?

SULLIVAN: I would be surprised. From our experience at ATF, firearms trafficking cases were fairly routine in terms of the nature and scope of the investigations. They didn't require authorities outside of ATF, and for the purpose of initiating it. Could folks have been briefed up, considering the violence in Mexico and the violence on the border, about the strategy, that's clearly possible. But the project itself was well within the rights of the director to essentially approve or to reject.

Tags: Operation Fast and Furious

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    • Author by ThomasJH268 (September 02, 2011 4:06 pm ET)
      3 1
      KELLY WRIGHT (ANCHOR): The President says he knew nothing about the operation, but the Justice Department has been slow in responding. Do you think this will lead all the way to the White House being involved?

      SULLIVAN: I would be surprised. From our experience at ATF, firearms trafficking cases were fairly routine in terms of the nature and scope of the investigations. They didn't require authorities outside of ATF, and for the purpose of initiating it. Could folks have been briefed up, considering the violence in Mexico and the violence on the border, about the strategy, that's clearly possible. But the project itself was well within the rights of the director to essentially approve or to reject.


      Really? You're talking about FOXPAC backed teabaggers. They're the same people who tried to impeach Clinton for getting his pole polished, they tried to set up a fund to construct an Anti-Clinton library and they are still trying to bring charges against him for Vince Foster's death.

      I can only imagine what they're planning to do to Obama, the "uppity man-child" who has dared to call out the financial and corporate corruption until they got their pals at FOXPAC to castrate him in the court of public opinion.
      Report Abuse
      • Author by cfncbeta (September 02, 2011 5:12 pm ET)
           
        Tea baggers? Is this the extent of our vocabulary? Wow this place is going to be fun. So this is the pro obama,muslim,nwo,communist,death lover site! It is said you must love death more than yourself. I love insanity. So much to do and so little time.
        Report Abuse
    • Author by pete592 (September 02, 2011 4:15 pm ET)
      3 1
      I love it when FoxPAC goes into an interview with high hopes of making another contribution to the Campaign For Obama's Failure, only to have their guest turn out to be a little more honest than they were expecting.
      Report Abuse
      • Author by cfncbeta (September 02, 2011 5:14 pm ET)
           
        Failure? This one needs no help. Take a look at his transcripts. Oh yeah that's right you can not.
        Report Abuse
    • Author by jimg9x21 (September 02, 2011 9:59 pm ET)
         
      Although everything has yet to come out on this operation, I would like a couple of answers to obvious questions. If this was a "sting" operation, where the ATF, under direction of the Justice Dept allowed guns to "walk" across the border in the hope of catching cartel big shots, who was going to make the arrest? The ATF with State Dept help or the uninformed Mexican authorities?
      The other question has to do with the Justice Dept and it's connection to the ATF. If the Justice Dept didn't know about the F and F program who exactly was overseeing the operation?
      I find Gertz's defense of the F and F program extremely weak in that he is trying to shift the focus away from what actually happened. It's a poor and telling tactic.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by Pine Buffalo (September 02, 2011 10:19 pm ET)
         
      Regardless, several of the over 200 weapons ATF allowed to get into bad hands wound up at the death scenes of US agents.

      That would justify homicide charges in some states, so whoever approved this massive screw up needs to face criminal charges related to those deaths.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by JayTea (September 03, 2011 5:20 am ET)
         
      The operation involved allowing guns to be smuggled across the border into Mexico without notifying the Mexican government, let alone getting their consent, to arm what is essentially a rebellion. That's damn near an act of war. How high would you have to go in the administration to find someone who believed they had that authority?

      J.
      Report Abuse
    • Author by Lone Ranger (September 03, 2011 9:18 pm ET)
         
      Oh really! So the ATF can decide to allow weapons, which are purchased by strongly suspected "straw purchasers" to buy and transfer guns like 50 Cal. Barrett's Rifles, AK-47 Variant rifles, and 5.57 Pistol capable of penetrating a police officers vest, to be delivered to cartels in Mexico.

      Is this what I as a former combat Marine is to accept from the latest Obama appointee to the ATF?

      Oh no baby, oh no former Marine JAG lawyer, it ain't going to happen, baby!

      Since when did Americans give ATF or any othe rfederal law enforcement agency the power to dictate foreign policy.

      Avila, the straw purchaser of the AKs found at the murder scene of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, could have been arrested prior to his purchase of the weapons, or immediately thereafter. It didn't happen, new acting director of the ATF!

      No, Brian Terry DIED! How dare you try to sell this nonsense to me and the rest of America. Obama blew it once again naming you, dumbo!

      The ATF was operating under a DOJ program, which I worked under for many years. I'm totally aware of the intricacies associated with an OCDETF proposal for an operation. It is scrutinized almost beyond comprehension.

      How could some indicidual ATF agent write a proposal where the plan included allowing guns to walk, guns being allowed to walk to Mexico?

      No, ATF does not and never will have that authority, and if the new acting director believes they should is nothing short of NUTS!
      Report Abuse
    • Author by Nanjing03 (September 04, 2011 8:48 am ET)
         
      Acually, it isn't just the so-called "right wing media" that is on top of events involving the Fast and Furious fiasco. This involves media across the board starting with CBS News which broke the story and has been on it ever since along with [the very liberal] Huffington Post, the LA Times and the NY Times, to name just a few. The online news chatter indicates that the House Reform subcommittee is about to expand into a joint Senate-House investigative committee, that there have been deliberate coverups and deliberate stonewalling from the top, that the CIA was involved in the placement of the funneled guns, and that a "deliberate illusion" of gunrunning to monstrous proportions was attempted to coincide with the controversial United Nations gun control resolution which Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have been cultivating for some time. The Congress is presently looking at felony actions and conspiracy to commit felonies against upper members of DOJ and BATFE, all while Obama and Holder are searching for lower level administrators to "throw themselves on their own swords" in the hope that these investigations will end before they get any higher. That worked when Janet Reno was attorney general, but it will not work with this generation of savvy administrators. I am afraid that Mr. Sullivan and the well meaning but uninformed people at Media Matters are the "lone voices in the wilderness" on this one. Mr. Sullivan, with perhaps an eye on future government appointments, has no stake in this claim so he can say and assume what he wants, but Media Matters might want to get on board before they get left behind.
      Report Abuse

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