The ATF has a dubious distinction that no other law enforcement agency in the country has. It’s the only law enforcement agency that is specifically directed to regulate and enforce laws curtailing a constitutionally protected right. Of course, now there’s a proposal to merge it into the DEA, which makes sense on one level, but would be awful on literally every other one. Still, until and unless that happens, the ATF is what it is.
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As such, they’re never going to be popular with the gun rights crowd. The agency is, for all intents and purposes, the antithesis of what we all stand for.
Yet now, the man in charge at the White House isn’t the same as the walking potato we had for the previous four years. There’s a commitment to protecting our rights, we’ve been told.
And we’ve seen some changes that are good.
However, Lee Williams over at The Gun Writer makes an argument that the changes are on the trivial side compared to many of the other issues.
The ATF should do nothing—take no official action—until they repair the lives that they destroyed carrying out Biden’s illegal orders. There are far too many real victims that we know about, and probably hundreds more who never reached out for help.
Quite frankly, no one really cares how former gun dealers can get relicensed until the ATF is held accountable for the atrocities it committed for years under the Biden administration, and the lives they ruined are made whole.
Here are some examples:
Russell Fincher, who is from the small town of Tuskahoma, Oklahoma, needed three jobs just to make ends meet. He taught high school history, served as a Baptist minister and sold guns and ammunition out of a small shed in the backyard. For reasons that are still not known, Fincher somehow came to the attention of the ATF.
A story published last year chronicled how 15 heavily armed ATF agents raided Fincher’s home, handcuffed him on his deck and then yelled, screamed and threatened the 52-year-old man—in front of this 13-year-old son—until he “voluntarily” surrendered his FFL. The ATF agents seized dozens of Fincher’s personal firearms, which he estimated were worth more than $50,000.
Fincher’s Federal Public Defender negotiated a plea agreement, in which Fincher pled guilty to selling ammunition to a prohibited person, which is punishable by up to 15 years imprisonment and a $250,000 fine. Prosecutors dismissed the two remaining charges once Fincher signed the plea agreement.
…
Mark “Choppa” Manley is a gun owner, a gun collector and a Second Amendment advocate who had more than 70 legally owned firearms stored in a gun safe at his Baltimore home. All of his firearms complied with both federal law and the laws of Maryland. He was always very careful about that, but that didn’t matter to ATF agents who raided his Baltimore home last year.
ATF agents busted down several doors to his home and threw two stun grenades—including one at his juvenile son.
More than a dozen ATF agents ransacked Manley’s home.
“They threatened to blow up my gun safe,” Manley said at the time. “I don’t have anything to hide, so I told them I’d open the safe. They uncuffed me and told me ‘Don’t try to run.’ Where was I gonna run to? My family was right there.”
Manley unlocked his gun safe and slowly swung open the door.
“They were all standing around waiting and hoping,” he said “This was their moment, they thought. They started pulling out rifles and shotguns, but everything was registered and Maryland-compliant. ‘We got nothing here,’ one of them said.”
Manely and his 17-year-old daughter were each handcuffed. His wife and children were moved to the rear of a SWAT van. It was 20-degrees outside, and they were only wearing pajamas.
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These are just two of the cases, all of which were documented by Williams prior to this post. Included are the stories of Patrick “Tate” Adamiak, who has been sentenced to 20 years in prison for owning items the ATF allegedly lied to the jury about, and Brian Malinowski, an airport executive who was gunned down in an ATF raid despite likely having no clue he was shooting at federal agents.
And that’s not all of them.
The truth of the matter is that the ATF is a waste of taxpayer money. Even if you believe their mission is good and just, they’re terrible at their jobs on the whole. Many agents never bother to leave their desks except to get a new cup of coffee, simply writing up charges for arrests made by local police. When they do get involved in investigations, we get things like Ruby Ridge or Waco…or the above-mentioned cases that all smell funny.
Let’s also not forget Operation Fast & Furious, which intentionally armed the Mexican cartels, and then was used to try and justify American gun control.
The idea of correcting these past sins is, I feel, the correct one. The Trump administration can and should address these as best they can. They cannot bring Brian Malinowski back to life, nor restore the years lost by those who had to deal with these fiascos, but they can at least make a noble effort to make it right. They can at least try.
Then the ATF needs to face massive reforms. Systems and regulations need to be put in place, preferably by Congress, so that these abuses can never happen again, regardless of who is left to enforce gun laws.
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If we see that kind of thing happen, there might actually be some semblance of justice. There might be a chance that we’ll see the feds finally learn from their mistakes, atone for their past sins, and stop viewing the American people as the enemy.
I mean, a man can dream, can’t he?
