Rumors are swirling surrounding a potential "shakeup" of personnel within the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms. Acting ATF Director Kenneth Melson, the man who watched Operation Fast and Furious being carried out through a live video feed in his cushy Washington D.C. office, may be moving to the Department of Justice, which oversees ATF.
Rep. Darrell Issa has released emails that show ATF Director Kenneth Melson, who is overseen by Attorney General Eric Holder, not only knew about Operation Fast and Furious, but was being briefed on a weekly basis about the progress and was watching Cartels purchase weapons used to kill innocent people from his cozy office in Washington D.C.
-The first e-mail from March 10, 2010, to Operation Fast and Furious Group VII Leader David Voth indicates that the two most senior leaders in ATF, Acting Director Kenneth Melson, and Deputy Director Billy Hoover, were “being briefed weekly on” Operation Fast and Furious. The document shows that both Melson and Hoover were “keenly interested in case updates.”
- A second e-mail from March 12, 2010, shows that Deputy Assistant Director for Field Operations William McMahon was so excited about Fast and Furious that he received a special briefing on the program in Phoenix - scheduled for a mere 45 minutes after his plane landed.
-A third - and perhaps the most disturbing – e-mail from April 12, 2010, indicates that Acting Director Melson was very much in the weeds with Operation Fast and Furious. After a detailed briefing of the program by the ATF Phoenix Field Division, Acting Director Melson had a plethora of follow-up questions that required additional research to answer. As the document indicates, Mr. Melson was interested in the IP Address for hidden cameras located inside cooperating gun shops. With this information, Acting Director Melson was able to sit at his desk in Washington and – himself – watch a live feed of the straw buyers entering the gun stores to purchase dozens of AK-47 variants.
I contacted the Obama DOJ press office earlier this morning to ask if this was a promotion for Melson and was told "I don't have anyone who can answer your question at this time." I was then was told someone would be contacting me later this afternoon about the issue. There is a strong possibility Melson is being promoted, either for helping the Obama Adminstration to implement more gun control regulations or as a way to get him to shut up after giving testimony to the House Oversight Committee, rather than punishing him for his involvement in the lethal scandal, afterall, three agents who were the brains behind Fast and Furious were promoted just two weeks ago.
The man waiting in the wings to fill Melson's position at ATF is Andrew Traver. Traver is an anti-Second Amendment, anti-gun Chicago zealot who helped fake the following "news story" about "semi-automatic" weapons. The problem is, the following report shows automatic weapons, which are not sold in gun shops in the United States, but are portrayed as semi-automatic rifles.
And that wasn't the first time the mainstream media has tried to help out anti-Second Amendment advocates.
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