All posts tagged Furious

Judiciary Chairman Unleashes on Holder for ‘Partisan’ Ignorance of Constitution

With a scathing roll call of Eric Holder’s sins, Lamar Smith paves the way for the attorney general’s upcoming appearance before his committee.

Via: PJMedia, by BRIDGET JOHNSON

The chairman of the House Judiciary Committee launched a scathing attack on the Department of Justice today with a report outlining how Attorney General Eric Holder’s agency is “ignoring the Constitution to impose a partisan agenda.”

“The pattern of pushing partisan ideology rather than neutrally enforcing the law began nearly as soon as the Administration took office and has continued unabated since,” the report from Rep. Lamar Smith states.

The Texas Republican said that under the Obama administration, the Justice Department “has become more partisan than ever.”

Smith has called Holder to testify before the committee on June 7 to answer for that partisanship.

“The Obama administration has ignored the constitutional balance of power between co-equal branches of government and blocked investigations of its actions. When the Administration doesn’t like a law, they refuse to enforce it. And if the Senate’s constitutional authority to approve political appointees gets in their way, the Administration ignores the Constitution,” Smith said.

“All government officials are bound by the limits of the Constitution and the rule of law, including the President and the Attorney General,” the chairman added.

The report delves into several high-profile examples of the DoJ’s quest to “impose the Administration’s partisan agenda on the American people.”

The first of these: Operation Fast and Furious.

“Since the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives’ (ATF) Operation Fast and Furious first became public in January, 2011, the Department has responded with a consistent focus on avoiding responsibility rather than addressing institutional flaws,” the report states.

Smith’s chairman’s report calls out Holder for his May 3, 2011, testimony before the committee in which he said that he “probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks.”

Months before the hearing, though, Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) had personally handed Holder a copy of his Jan. 27, 2011, letter regarding the matter, and documents later revealed by the DoJ that fall included memos to Holder with summaries of the gun-walking scandal.

Holder denied giving untruthful testimony, but under pressure from lawmakers eventually said he’d meant to say “a few months” before the committee.

The Department of Justice responded to a CBS News Freedom of Information Act request on Fast and Furious last week by sending mostly blank pages to the news network.

Smith’s report also faults the DoJ for “rushing to court to oppose state laws aimed at improving immigration enforcement while ignoring sanctuary cities and other policies which explicitly violate federal immigration law,” knocking its legal action against Arizona’s SB1070.

“Even if the Department’s argument were not entirely frivolous, it is a much weaker case than could be mounted against states like New York, Massachusetts, and Illinois that openly violate their duty to support federal immigration enforcement,” it says. “While Arizona’s law complements and strengthens federal immigration policy, the laws of these states and some of the cities within them explicitly violate the Illegal Immigration Reform and Immigrant Responsibility Act (IIRIRA) of 1996—yet DOJ refuses to take any action against them.”

The report asserts that since the DoJ has not brought a single court action to block sanctuary city policies or tuition breaks for illegal immigrants, the choice to focus limited resources on strained, weaker arguments shows the department’s bias.

“The glaring inconsistency can best be explained by highly partisan decision making influencing which cases to pursue,” it says.

“The Justice Department claims to be acting to protect the interests of Congress, arguing that except in narrow circumstances only Congress can legislate immigration enforcement. In truth, the Department ignores Congress except when it can help the Administration achieve its partisan goals, in this case its fiercely anti-enforcement immigration agenda.”

Smith then goes after Holder & Co. for challenging voter ID laws, asserting that it’s due to partisan bias that the Justice Department puts taxpayer dollars to “waste” with its challenges.

“The Justice Department claims that in South Carolina minorities are 20 percent more likely than whites to lack photo ID,” the report states. “This sounds significant until you examine the original data. 90% of minorities have photo IDs compared with 91.6% of whites. The Department’s presentation is mathematically true (because 10% is technically 20 percent more than 8.4%) but it masks that in reality, the Department is battling over a difference of less than 2%.”

The report faults the DoJ for blocking congressional inquiries, including oversight requests — five from the Judiciary Committee alone since July 2011 — probing just how deep of a role Supreme Court Justice Elena Kagan had in shaping ObamaCare before her appointment to the court.

The Justice Department has claimed that the Judiciary Committee — studying her background to ensure that federal law governing recusals is adequate — “has no legitimate legislative interest in the material,” according to the chairman’s report.

“The Administration’s lack of cooperation only heightens concerns that they have something to hide,” the report states. “Unfortunately, the Administration’s stonewalling of Congress could result in an unconstitutional law being upheld.”

Smith proceeds to take on the DoJ for refusing to stand behind the Defense of Marriage Act. Holder informed Congress on Feb. 23, 2011, that his department would no longer defend DOMA in court, arguing that it violated the constitutional guarantee of equal protection.

“The unprecedented nature of the Attorney General’s arguments and the evasion of accountability represented by continuing to enforce the law while not defending it combine to support the inference that the Administration’s stance is based on its partisan agenda rather than on a sincere analysis of the Constitution and, as such, the Administration’s non-defense of the Defense of Marriage Act is a usurpation of Congress’s legislative function,” the report states.

Finally, the chairman goes after Justice for turning a blind eye to constitutional limits of President Obama’s recess appointment power.

Obama sparked fury in Congress with three recess appointments to the National Labor Relations Board and another to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau on Jan. 4. The Senate was not technically in recess at the time, but in pro forma sessions with no business to be conducted — which could be reversed if senators were asked to conduct any business — as agreed by both parties.

Smith linked the appointment to bad advice given to Obama by Justice Department counsel, who found that the President “has discretion to conclude that the Senate is unavailable to perform its advise-and-consent function and to exercise his power to make recess appointments.”

“The invocation by the President of the recess appointment power when the Senate was not in recess was an unconstitutional evasion of the Senate’s power of advice and consent,” the report said. “It encroached upon the Senate’s constitutional prerogatives and aggrandized power to the President.”

After a roll call of Justice Department sins, the chairman concludes that “the Constitution has not been guarded with care.”

“[Holder] promised that under his leadership, the Department of Justice would be free from partisanship,” Smith’s report states. “He testified that in his tenure ‘law enforcement decisions must be untainted by partisanship.’”

“The reality has been different from the promise.”

 

Bridget Johnson is PJ Media’s Washington, D.C., editor.
Enhanced by Zemanta

CBS News: Holder Handing Over Blank Pages To Requests For “Fast And Furious” Documents…

Via: Zip. It’s almost like he’s hiding something.

(CBS News) — For more than a year, CBS News has been investigating the Bureau of Alcohol Tobacco and Firearms’ “Fast and Furious” operation and related cases that also employed the controversial tactic of “gunwalking.”

With Justice Department officials refusing all interview requests to date, CBS News requested numerous public documents through the Freedom of Information Act.

So far, all of the requests that have been answered have been denied in part or in full.

This week, we received a partial response to a request made more than a year ago. It asked for communications involving “Project Gunrunner,” the umbrella program for Fast and Furious, from 2010 through April 2011.

Specifically, it sought any communications to which any of the following top Justice officials were a party:

Attorney General Eric Holder; Lanny Breuer, Assistant Attorney General for the Criminal Division; Kevin Carwile, chief of the Capital Case Unit; and Deputy Assistant Attorney Generals Bruce Schwarz and Kenneth Blanco.

The response includes mostly-blank pages.

Keep reading…

Enhanced by Zemanta

Issa, Boehner at odds over holding Holder in contempt of Congress

House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa has drafted a 48-page contempt of Congress citation for Attorney General Eric Holder over Operation Fast and Furious. It now appears Issa is currently moving forward without the support of House Speaker John Boehner. Holder’s Department of Justice has provided only about 7,000 pages worth of the more than 70,000 pages of documents Issa has subpoenaed related to Operation Fast and Furious. Issa and many others on Capitol Hill have threatened for months that they’ll hold Holder in contempt without actually doing it. This 48-page contempt citation is the first official step in moving forward with contempt proceedings. To actually effectively hold Holder in contempt, Issa would need House GOP leadership to play ball. At this point, it appears as though House Speaker John Boehner is only partially in his court. A House Republican leadership aide told The Daily Caller on Friday that “while there are very legitimate arguments to be made in favor of such an action [holding Holder in contempt], no decision has been made to move forward with one by the Speaker or by House Republican leaders.” Even so, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday morning that top committee officials from Issa’s House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform “recently met for most of a day in the House speaker’s office and were given the green light to proceed toward a contempt citation.” The Times cited anonymous sources. That GOP leadership aide also told TheDC that the LA Times report is inaccurate. A spokesman for Issa refused to comment when The Daily Caller presented him with GOP leadership’s open opposition to the notion it approved contempt proceedings. If Issa does get the green light, it appears as though he’s going to make his moves around Memorial Day or shortly thereafter. During an appearance on Fox News Thursday night, South Carolina Republican Rep. Trey Gowdy — a member of the House oversight committee who’s been close to this investigation — said Memorial Day is Holder’s deadline. “Before Memorial Day, Eric Holder will either comply or he will suffer consequences,” Gowdy said. “When I say consequences, I mean contempt of Congress.” Not one government official has been held accountable for Operation Fast and Furious. Scores of lawmakers — 125 House members, three U.S. senators, two governors — and many major political figures, including presumptive Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney, have demanded Holder’s resignation or firing over Fast and Furious. Boehner has not called for Holder’s resignation, nor has he been vocal about Fast and Furious save for a few times saying he backed Issa’s push for accountability. Some have speculated that Boehner put the brakes on Fast and Furious accountability momentum building late last year into early this year but Boehner’s staff vehemently denies those accusations. Follow Matthew on Twitter

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/27/issa-boehner-at-odds-over-holding-holder-in-contempt-of-congress/#ixzz1tGEOmulz

Enhanced by Zemanta

‘FAST AND FURIOUS’ EXPOSES WHITE HOUSE ANTI-GUN AGENDA, COVERUP

Katie Pavlich’s new book, “Fast and Furious,” assembles the devastating evidence that implicates the Obama administration for its botched gun-walking operation and ensuing coverup to mislead Congress and the American people.

Few journalists have devoted as much time reporting on Fast and Furious as Pavlich. As the news editor of Townhall, she has asked questions the mainstream media ignored. Now her book pieces the story together for a complete picture of how a government-run operation turned deadly.

She’ll speak on Tuesday at noon ET at The Bloggers Briefing. Breitbart TV, in partnership with The Heritage Foundation, will air it live.

Operation Fast and Furious began in 2009 as an effort to eliminate high-level arms trafficking networks. Guns were allowed to “walk,” and rather than arresting straw purchasers and cartel buyers, hundreds were used to commit crimes in the United States and Mexico. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was killed with one in 2010, and an estimated 1,400 guns remain missing.

As previously documented by Breitbart News Network, Pavlich’s book contains new information questioning Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano’s testimony to Congress as well as the media’s efforts to shield the Obama administration from criticism.

The book details President Obama’s lifelong mission to subvert the Second Amendment, long before he was seeking federal office. Pavlich also documents how Fast and Furious plays into his administration’s anti-gun agenda. She cites a Washington Post story from Dec. 15, 2010, before details of Fast and Furious had emerged, in which federal authorities attempt to blame the rise in gun violence on U.S. gun shops.

The Post story referred to Project Gunrunner as an operation to inspect, interdict, and seize guns from straw purchasers. It did not mention an ATF operation to allow straw purchasers to buy guns for the Mexican drug cartels. Some of the very same ATF and Justice Department officials who blamed American gun shops for the spike in Mexican gun crime had in fact been helping the drug cartels to help themselves for over a year.

The book provides information from sources and whistleblowers who offer a behind-the-scenes perspective about the botched operation. One of them, ATF agent John Dodson, was punished for his decision to question why arrests weren’t made before the guns fell into the hands of ruthless criminals in Mexico.

Enhanced by Zemanta

FAST & FURIOUS SUSPECT ARRESTED & RELEASED THREE TIMES

Yesterday FOX News revealed that the main suspect of Operation Fast and Furious was arrested and released three times. THREE TIMES. Two of those arrests happened in Phoenix, the origin of Fast and Furious.

FOX News showed a video of Manuel Celis-Acosta firing 10 rounds from a 45 caliber handgun purchased illegally by his accomplice Sean Stewart. But unfortunately it took the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry to end the operation.

“We could have taken him in and prosecuted him anytime. It’s either total incompetence. Or maybe it’s something a bit more coordinated that the Department of Justice is not willing to talk about yet,” Representative Jason Chaffetz told Fox News.

Congressional investigators think Justice doesn’t want to talk about Mr. Acosta’s possible role as an informant. Here’s the timeline FOX provides to prove why:

Fast & Furious started in October 2009. Mr. Acosta was first arrested in April 2010 in Phoenix with cocaine and handguns hidden in his truck. He was released and not charged. Then, in May 2010, immigration stopped him from crossing the border because he had 74 rounds of ammunition hidden his car. According to The LA Times  the top Fast and Furious investigator, Special Agent Hope MacAllister, put her phone number on a $10 bill and gave it to Mr. Acosta after he pledged to cooperate and keep in touch. But, of course, he didn’t.

Released and no charges.

In October 2010 they caught him on tape in the shootout by a surveillance camera attached to a telephone pole. The police found 15 shell casings. Mr. Acosta is arrested again. He is also released….again.

The Phoenix police say they did forward both cases to the county attorney’s office. There were no charges the first time, but the second time he was held on charges of illegally discharging a firearm within city limits.

Sources told FOX News they think after the October incident they didn’t want to take him out of the equation because it would have harmed their case. This is when he probably officially became an informant and protected by the government.

Enhanced by Zemanta

VAST LEFT WING CONSPIRACY: DOJ REFERS REPORTER TO MEDIA MATTERS, SOURCE CLAIMS

Katie Dixon, a ‘confidential assistant’ in the Office of Public Affairs at the Department of Justice, reportedly sent an email to Washington Free Beacon writer C.J. Ciaramella that she had been directed to send him a link to Media Matters for America, which holds weekly “strategy calls” with the White House, in response to an inquiry  regarding the Operation Fast and Furious scandal. In a tweet Friday evening, @CJCiaramella said:

Requested comment from DOJ re: @KatiePavlich‘s #fastandfurious book. DOJ sent me a link to a Media Matters article

He then linked to what appears to be an email from Friday, April 20th at 5:15pm from Dixon.

The screenshot of that email shows Dixon saying:

Per your request for information on a Fast and Furious book, I was told to direct your questions to the FBI and also to provide you with a link to this story:

The message then linked to a story titled Fast And Fallacious: Pavlich’s Book On ATF Operation Filled With Falsehoods. At the time of this writing, Dixon has not responded to Breitbart News to confirm that she sent the email shown in the tweet.

Pavlich’s book, which is currently a top seller on Amazon.com, is described as telling readers “in chilling detail, just what this operation conducted by the ATF, under the supervision of the Justice Department, entailed” and saying that “equally appalling is the blatant cover-up of wrongdoing by the Obama administration.”

In a statement to Breitbart News, Pavlich said…

For more than a year now, Americans have been stonewalled, ignored and disrespected in our quests for information about the Obama administration’s lethal Operation Fast and Furious. The fact that the Obama Justice Department, headed by Attorney General Eric Holder, is now sending reporters to the far left, George Soros funded, Media Matters for factual information about one of the bloodiest scandals in U.S. history, is no surprise and totally predictable. This is just an extension of the Obama administration’s shameless coverup and refusal to tell the truth about Fast and Furious.

The Justice Department has blood on its hands, there are at least 300 Mexican citizens dead and two of our federal agents have been murdered as a result of this program. The Obama administration as a whole refuses to take responsibility and provide transparency for an American public outraged by this scandal. The Justice Department is responsible for upholding the law in a fair, unbiased and non-political manner, but the current politically appointed DOJ leadership has chosen to engage in promoting a far Left and controversial agenda. Apparently, the new spokesperson for the Justice Department is Media Matters. If you want the truth, read my bookFast and Furious: Barack Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal and Its Shameless Coverup. It is clear we won’t be getting it from the Justice Department on this crucial issue.

Ciaramella concluded via Twitter, “The Media Matters article doesn’t address my specific question at all. Keep up the good work, DOJ.”

UPDATE : Deparment of Justice PR  Katie Dixon also worked for the Democratic National Committee and Organizing For America, according to her LinkedIn profile.

Nonprofit; 51-200 employees; Political Organization industry

September 2009 – December 2009 (4 months) Washington D.C. Metro Area

Fulfilled multimedia requests for Democratic congressional offices and state parties, including national media coverage of the death and funeral of Senator Ted Kennedy for family and staff. Also tracked and monitored major national political events for both Democratic and Republican figures to include in daily media tracker schedule for use by the DNC and the White House. Also researched and organized public record archives on major GOP figures, including former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.

Nonprofit; 51-200 employees; Political Organization industry

July 2009 – August 2009 (2 months) Washington D.C. Metro Area

Used VoteBuilder and the Voter Activation Network to search and organize personal health care stories on behalf of Organizing for America for public use in campaign literature, the Organizing for America website and speeches by the President and federal elected officials in support of the Affordable Care Act.

She also worked for the Sunlight Foundation and tweeted enthusiastically about Obama’s Bundler List on 7/15/11, saying “Now this is f**king awesome: http://bit.ly/n4dqQ4(@sunfoundation).” Ms. Dixon’s tweets are protected butare viewable here. (h/t Twitter user @teezieldors)

Enhanced by Zemanta

Prime gunwalking suspect was held by ATF but released, documents show

Badge of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firea...

Via: CBS News

The prime suspect in the botched gun trafficking investigation known as “Fast and Furious” — Manuel Acosta — was taken into custody and might have been stopped from trafficking weapons to Mexico’s killer drug cartel early on. But the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) let him go, according to new documents obtained by CBS News.

An ATF “Report of Investigation” obtained by CBS News shows Border Patrol agents stopped Acosta’s truck on May 29, 2010. Inspectors said they found illegal materials including an “AK type, high capacity drum magazine loaded with 74 rounds of 7.62 ammunition underneath the spare tire.” They also noted ledgers including a “list of firearms such as an AR15 short and a Bushmaster” and a “reference about money given to ‘killer.’”

ATF “Report of Investigation”

The Border Patrol ran a check and found Acosta was already “under investigation for firearms trafficking” in Fast and Furious, so they called in the lead ATF case agent Hope MacAllister. Under questioning, Acosta allegedly described his contacts with a Mexican cartel member nicknamed “Chendi,” and admitted going to Chendi’s house for a shipment of narcotics.

More gunwalker questions for Attorney General Holder
PICTURES: ATF “Gunwalking” scandal timeline

But ATF knew even more about Acosta’s alleged illegal activities than what he described in the interview. ATF trace records showed “a large number of the weapons purchase by the Acosta organization are AK type rifles or FN Herstal pistols” which Acosta referred to as “cop killers” and said were preferred by drug cartels.

Instead of pursuing charges, Agent MacAllister asked Acosta if he’d be willing to cooperate with federal agents. He agreed and was released. Apparently, the promised cooperation never materialized. The report notes that 17 days after Acosta was let loose, he still had “not initiated any contact with Special Agent MacAllister.”

In a letter today, Congressional Republicans investigating Fast and Furious asked the Justice Department why Acosta wasn’t arrested in May of 2010. They also want to know why the Justice Department failed to turn over the documents on Acosta’s detainment and release, which were covered under a longstanding subpoena.

Documents: ATF used “Fast and Furious” to make the case for gun regulations

Memos contradict Holder on Fast and Furious
Agent: I was ordered to let guns “walk” into Mexico
Gunwalking scandal uncovered at ATF

One law enforcement source calls the Acosta report “completely embarrassing.” “He’s exporting ammunition, which is a violation of law,” says the source. “But they let him go.”

Before releasing Acosta, MacAllister wrote her contact information on a $10 bill at Acosta’s request, gave it to him, then warned him “not to participate in any illegal activity unless under her direction.”

Acosta wasn’t arrested until Feb. 2, 2011, more than eight months after the Border Patrol stop. By then, ATF had allowed more than 2,000 weapons to “walk” into the hands of Mexican drug cartels, and two of the rifles had turned up at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

The Justice Department and ATF had no immediate comment. ATF officials who approved of Fast and Furious have said they were trying to get to the “big fish” in a drug cartel.

In a related case also run by ATF’s Phoenix office, CBS News has reported a grenade parts trafficker named Jean Baptiste Kingery was caught smuggling 114 disassembled grenades in a tire in 2010, but was released. The same prosecutors faulted in Fast and Furious allegedly refused to bring charges saying grenade parts are “novelty items” and the case “lacked jury appeal.” Mexican authorities arrested Kingery a year later at a stash house with enough materials for 1,000 grenades.

The Inspector General has been investigating Fast and Furious for more than a year. Attorney General Eric Holder, who’s denied knowing about any gunwalking, has said use of the “inappropriate tactics is neither acceptable nor excusable.”

The Justice Department had no immediate comment. ATF told CBS News: “The criminal case is still ongoing in federal court, and there is also inspector general’s investigation looking at the overall case. Therefore, ATF cannot comment about the investigation.

Enhanced by Zemanta

Calls for Holder’s resignation heating back up as six more congressmen join the surge

 

Six more U.S. Congressmen have demanded Attorney General Eric Holder leave his post this week in the wake of Operation Fast and Furious, bringing the number of U.S. House members pushing for a change in Justice Department leadership to 109.

Spokespeople for Florida Republican Reps. Cliff Stearns and Mario Diaz-Balart told The Daily Caller their bosses agree with the surging group of members already demanding Holder’s resignation. Meanwhile, four new members have signed onto the official House resolution of “no confidence” in Holder — House Resolution 490 –  because of Fast and Furious: Republican Reps. Bill Huizenga of Michigan, Cory Gardner of Colorado, and Pete Olson and Mike Conaway, both of Texas.

The groundswell has grown steadily since the first House members demanded Holder resign last October. Three U.S. Senators, two sitting governors and all major Republican presidential candidates have joined those 109 House members.

Fast and Furious was a Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives program overseen by Holder’s Department of Justice in which the Obama administration facilitated the sale of about 2,000 firearms to Mexican drug cartels. The way the Obama administration facilitated these sales is by allowing the weapons to “walk” into Mexico via “straw purchasers.”

Straw purchasers are people who buy weapons in the United States with the known intention of turning around and illegally selling them to somebody else. ATF officials knew what these straw purchasers were doing in Fast and Furious, and chose to allow these transactions to continue instead of intervening in an effort to track the weapons’ movements. That means the ATF allowed the guns to get into the hands of the drug cartels — or let them “walk” — instead of seizing the weapons beforehand

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/03/07/calls-for-holder%e2%80%99s-resignation-heating-back-up-as-six-more-congressmen-join-the-surge/#ixzz1oS8Hu45e

Enhanced by Zemanta

Connecting the Dots on Fast and Furious

Via: American Thinker

Murdered Border Patrol Officer Brian Terry

When Eric Holder testified last December before the House Judiciary Committee about the Fast and Furious gun-walking scandal, he proclaimed in his opening statement that the Justice Department had been “fully cooperative and responsive in its dealing with Congress.”

But later during the hearing, Florida Congresswoman Sandy Adams asked Holder about his communications with his top aides concerning Fast and Furious.

“Did you at any time — at any time — e-mail on your personal account with Larry Breuer — Lanny Breuer and Gary Grindler in regards to Fast and Furious ever?” asked Adams.

Holder: Ever?

Adams: Yes…

Holder: I don’t know.

Adams then asked, “[W]ould you check and get back with us?  If you need some help, I’m sure your agency personnel can get into those computers.”

Keep reading…

Enhanced by Zemanta

Eric Holder on the Hill faces friendlier fire

Eric Holder testified before the House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday.

Attorney General Eric Holder testified before the House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday, noting the “appropriate” way he was asked about Fast and Furious there – unlike in other hearings where he had been grilled at length over the gun-walking program.

Eric Holder testified before the House Appropriations Committee on Tuesday. | AP

“This is very interesting. I’m having a conversation about Fast and Furious in a very appropriate, neutral, detached way. Which by the way is fundamentally different from my experience with other committees. And this is – I wouldn’t say pleasant – but it’s different,” said Holder.

Holder’s comments are a subtle jab at House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) and Republicans in the House Oversight and Judiciary committees, who have been much more contentious when questioning Holder about the controversial Fast and Furious program.

“There is a certain amount of mistrust, a certain amount of partisan wrangling going on,” said Holder about his relationship with Capitol Hill.

Before the House Oversight Committee earlier this month, Holder had said that he thought the questions asked at that hearing were generally “tough” and “fair,” with the exception of one question from Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle (R-N.Y.).

“How many more Border Patrol agents would have had to die as part of Operation Fast and Furious for you to take responsibility?” Buerkle had asked.

Tuesday’s hearing, which was mainly about Justice Department budget matters, stayed largely clear from gun-walking program.

“I’ve not shied away from the fact that I’m ultimately responsible for what happens in the Department of Justice,” said Holder, when asked about the gun-walking program, while noting that the DoJ Inspector General’s report was still forthcoming.

“It was a bad attempt at trying to deal with a very pernicious problem, where guns are flowing from the United States to Mexico. In its conception, in its execution, it was fundamentally flawed,” Holder said about Fast and Furious. “I understand what they were trying to do, but they were doing it extremely, extremely poorly… it’s bad law enforcement.”

The Department of Justice and the attorney general have been under fire for over a year regarding the controversial operation, which attempted to investigate drug cartels and weapons traffickers but instead ended up supplying them with weapons. Investigators lost thousands of firearms, many of which crossed the border into Mexico.

Firearms linked to the operation were later found to have been involved in the December 2010 shooting death of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/73379.html#ixzz1nhn95Mzj

Enhanced by Zemanta