The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives officially welcomed FBI Director and Acting ATF Director Kash Patel to his new position on Monday.
ATF welcomes Acting Director Kash Patel to ATF, who was sworn in and had his first visit to ATF Headquarters in Washington, D.C. today. We are enthusiastic to work together for a safer America! #WeAreATF pic.twitter.com/3KMkkfSGLv
— ATF HQ (@ATFHQ) February 24, 2025
Patel is expected to clean house at the agency, which has a sordid history of targeting lawful gun owners, selling guns to Mexican narco terrorists, losing machine guns, using mentally disabled individuals for stings and much more.
The Committee first became aware of Operation Fearless, a storefront operation in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, from media reports in January 2013. These reports made clear that Operation Fearless was fundamentally mismanaged, evidenced by the fact that nearly $40,000 in merchandise and three guns were stolen from ATF agents during the operation, including a fully-automatic rifle. After months of delay, ATF officials finally briefed congressional staff on April 15, 2013, representing that such storefront operations were limited to the single instance in Milwaukee. Subsequent media reports, however, revealed that the ATF used these same storefront stings across the country. In one case, the ATF exploited a mentally disabled man to work at the storefront. In another, the ATF had a mentally disabled man tattoo a squid smoking a joint on his neck.
Last week Attorney General Pam Bondi removed ATF's chief counsel from her job.
Bondi Starts Clearing Out ATF
— Townhall.com (@townhallcom) February 21, 2025
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