Rep. Labrador: Holder Must Resign

Fresh off of President Obama saying he has "complete confidence" in Attorney General Eric Holder's May 3, 2011 testimony to Congress, Rep. Raul Labrador, who sits on the House Ovesight Committee, is calling for Holder's resignation.

Mr. Labrador has been critical of potential abuses of the Bureau of Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BAFTE) since his March 17, 2011 letter to Oversight Chairman Darrel Issa urging his committee to conduct in-depth investigations into allegations of weapons being sold, with federal government complicity, to Mexican cartels. Over 1,500 such weapons remain unaccounted for and already one was found at the scene of the death of an American law enforcement officer.

Labrador stated, "I first learned about Fast and Furious early this year from several of my constituents. I then asked Chairman Issa to hold hearings on the topic. As I attended the hearings and reviewed the evidence, I was careful to not jump to any conclusions about the extent of Mr. Holder's involvement. However, the recently published documents that directly link Mr. Holder to Fast and Furious have convinced me that he is either lying or grossly incompetent."

Rep. Labrador continued, "The Attorney General of the United States has an obligation to provide truthful and accurate testimony to Congress. When Attorney General Eric Holder testified before Congress on May 3, his statements were either untrue or deliberately misleading. It is clear from recently-released documents that Mr. Holder did in fact know about Fast and Furious well before he publicly admitted. Attorney General Holder has a troubling pattern of failed cooperation with the legislative branch. Because of this intentional stonewalling and his misleading testimony, I now call for Mr. Holder's resignation. It is clear he has not been honest about the extent of his involvement with the failed Fast and Furious program and should not be entrusted with managing the Department of Justice.

He cannot avoid responsibility for his involvement with a government program that directly led to the tragic death of a decorated U.S. Border Patrol agent. As our nation's top enforcer of the principles of law and justice, Mr. Holder has lost all credibility and should step down immediately. The question now is if Mr. Holder is he only protecting himself or is he also protecting others - perhaps all the way to the top of the administration," Labrador concluded.

Operation Fast and Furious was a gun trafficking operation conducted by the United States Federal Government under the direction of the Obama Justice Department. The entire operation was centered around deliberately allowing guns to be trafficked into Mexico, it was in no way an "operation against gun smuggling."

"Allowing loads of weapons that we knew to be destined for criminals, this was the plan. It was so mandated," Special Agent John Dodson ATF Phoenix Field Division