Geller Calls For Impeachment Based On Gunwalker Myths

Special Programs Guns & Public Safety

Written by Matt Gertz

Published

In July, Islamophobe Pam Geller suggested that she supported impeaching President Obama on the basis of the myth that his administration supported the release of the Lockerbie bomber. Now she's found a new false rationale for impeachment: Obama's supposed knowledge of the ATF's failed Operation Fast and Furious.

Geller claims that both Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder knew the controversial operational details of that failed gunrunning sting, which is currently under DOJ and congressional investigation. Her evidence? Obama's support for economic recovery legislation which did not fund the operation, and a speech in which Holder did not talk about Fast and Furious.

In a post entitled “Direct Evidence: Holder Lied, Bragged About Project Gunrunner In Mexico In 2009,” Geller wrote:

This is the most corrupt and criminal administration in American history. And their contempt and disgust for the American people is degenerate, rotten, scandalous. Holder must be fired. Obama should be impeached for Fast and Furious. The Republicans must uphold the laws of this country.

Geller points to a blog post which details how “despite... repeatedly denying knowledge of Project Gunrunner,” Obama approved stimulus funding for the program and Holder gave a speech referencing it.

Apparently we need to point this out again: Project Gunrunner and Operation Fast and Furious are not the same thing.

Obama and Holder never denied knowing about Project Gunrunner, a high-profile effort begun under the Bush administration in which ATF agents were directed from other offices to the Mexican border region in order to reduce cross-border gun trafficking. They have consistently denied knowledge of the details of Fast and Furious, the failed operation run under Project Gunrunner by a team from the ATF's Phoenix office, in which agents allowed guns to be transferred to known traffickers in the hopes of building a complex conspiracy case against cartels.

The Recovery Act funded Project Gunrunner operations, but not in Phoenix. Holder's speech references Project Gunrunner, but not Fast and Furious.

Indeed, Fast and Furious was not begun until fall 2009, months after Holder's comment.

Even right-wing bloggers have pointed out that people making this conflation are wrong. But Geller apparently can't be bothered to fact-check.