Ted Stevens

Judge Demands Report On Prosecutorial Misconduct In Ted Stevens Case Be Made Public

Ryan J. Reilly | February 8, 2012, 10:20AM

Former Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK)

A federal judge in D.C. ruled Wednesday that an unredacted copy of an independent report on prosecutorial misconduct during the federal investigation of the late Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens (R) has to be made public by March 15.

U.S. District Court Judge Emmet G. Sullivan said the report written by Henry F. Schuelke "chronicles significant prosecutorial misconduct in a highly publicized investigation and prosecution brought by the Public Integrity Section against an incumbent United States Senator."

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Mike Vanderboegh

GOP 'Sons-A-Bitches' Going Soft On Gunwalking, Says Blogger Who Broke 'Fast And Furious'

Ryan J. Reilly | February 3, 2012, 6:27AM

Mike Vanderboegh is drinking Diet Mountain Dew in the cafeteria of the Rayburn building on Capitol Hill, and he is pissed.

Not because his flight from Alabama was almost "as bumpy as [his] first marriage," nor because he almost got into a physical altercation with an "idiot street urban adventurer" outside the National Archives who said Vanderboegh looked like Newt Gingrich.

The former militia man turned gun rights blogger is angry because he thinks the Republican "sons-a-bitches" on the House Oversight Committee put on the "ultimate display of public limp dickery" during a Thursday hearing in which Attorney General Eric Holder testified about ATF's botched Operation Fast and Furious.

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National Defense Authorization Act

Holder: Obama Will Issue Signing Statement With NDAA Detention Rules

Ryan J. Reilly | December 21, 2011, 4:02PM

Attorney General Eric Holder confirmed speculation Wednesday that President Barack Obama would issue a signing statement when he makes the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) and its controversial detention provisions law.

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Fast And Furious

Inspector's Probe Of Fast And Furious Likely Encompasses Bush-Era 'Gun Walking'

Ryan J. Reilly | December 16, 2011, 1:58PM

The Justice Department Inspector General's review of the flawed ATF program in which guns were allowed to "walk" across the Mexican border will include other investigations that used similar methods, according to the IG's semi-annual report to Congress.

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Fast And Furious

Republicans Buy Into NRA's 'Fast And Furious' Gun Control Conspiracy Theory

Ryan J. Reilly | December 16, 2011, 11:35AM

Out of the sound and fury of Attorney General Eric Holder's day before the House last week one thing was clear: Republican members of Congress are latching onto the conspiracy theory that the Obama administration let guns "walk" into Mexico in order to erode Americans' second amendment rights.

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Eric Holder

Obama Administration Backs Bill Combating Voter Intimidation, Deception

Ryan J. Reilly | December 13, 2011, 6:05PM

United States Attorney General Eric Holder

The Obama administration is signaling support for a forthcoming Senate bill that would impose tough criminal and civil penalties on individuals who make and distribute campaign literature with false information intended to deceive voters and suppress turnout.

Attorney General Eric Holder will announce in a major speech on voting rights in Texas on Tuesday night that Sens. Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and Ben Cardin (D-MD) will introduce the bill on Wednesday. The bill will be "narrowly tailored" to respect provisions of the First Amendment, according to Cardin's office. It will apply to "only a small category of false communications that occur during the last 90 days before an election, such as literature listing the wrong date or time for the election, giving inaccurate information about voter eligibility, or promoting false endorsements of candidates." A nearly identical bill was introduced by Schumer and then-Sen. Barack Obama back in 2007 but never passed.

In his speech at the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library And Museum in Austin, Holder will call for election systems "that are free from fraud, discrimination, and partisan influence" and will say that protecting the right to vote and combating discrimination "must be viewed, not only as a legal issue - but as a moral imperative." Holder's speech also offers a challenge:

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Eric Holder

Holder: 'You Don't See Huge Amounts Of Voter Fraud Out There'

Ryan J. Reilly | December 13, 2011, 6:00AM

Attorney General Eric Holder

If you've been following the debate over restrictive voter ID laws, the fact that there aren't many instances of voter fraud out there (especially of the type that could be prevented by voter ID laws) isn't news. What's interesting is who's saying it.

"You constantly hear about voter fraud... but you don't see huge amounts of vote fraud out there," Attorney General Eric Holder told the Washington Post.

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Fast And Furious

Holder, Chaffetz Get Into Heated Exchange Over Fast And Furious (VIDEO)

Ryan J. Reilly | December 8, 2011, 5:48PM

Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT), Attorney General Eric Holder

One of the most heated exchanges of Attorney General Eric Holder's testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on Thursday came thanks to questioning from Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who accused Holder of being "oblivious and disengaged" from guns "walking" during Operation Fast and Furious.

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Jason Chaffetz

Holder Squares Off With House Republicans At Fast And Furious Hearing

Ryan J. Reilly | December 8, 2011, 2:58PM

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) questions Attorney General Eric Holder during the House Judiciary Committee's hearing on Operation Fast and Furious on Capitol Hill on December 8, 2011.

Attorney General Eric Holder went toe-to-toe with House Republicans on Thursday over the Justice Department's handling of Operation Fast and Furious, the program which allowed weapons to flow over the border into Mexico.

The hearing was combative at times, with Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) bringing in posters and boxes of documents to hammer his points home.

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Drug Enforcement Agency

Issa Expands Probe Of ATF's Fast And Furious To Examine DEA Money Laundering

Ryan J. Reilly | December 6, 2011, 5:35AM

A stash of money seized by DEA.

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) on Monday expanded his investigation into why ATF let guns "walk" across the Mexican border during Operation Fast and Furious, to include a probe of DEA laundering money to Mexican drug cartels.

The New York Times reported on Sunday that U.S. narcotics agents "have laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington's expanding role in Mexico's fight against drug cartels."

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Fast And Furious

Emails Show DOJ Trusted ATF Denials Of Fast And Furious 'Gun Walking' Allegations

Ryan J. Reilly | December 5, 2011, 3:06PM

Attorney General Eric Holder testifies before the Senate Judiciary Committee in a hearing examining the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms' botched gun-walking operation, Fast and Furious. November, 8, 2011.

It was early 2011. Reports that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives had let guns "walk" across the border to Mexico were only just starting to emerge. Sen. Chuck Grassley, the ranking Republican on the Senate Judiciary Committee, wrote a letter to to the Justice Department on Jan. 27 asking if an assault rifle bought by a suspected "straw purchaser" during an ATF-authorized transaction with a firearms dealer was found at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.

If contemporaneous emails sent by Justice Department officials are any indication, they didn't have any clue what Grassley was talking about. And when officials in the U.S. Attorney's office in Arizona and at ATF headquarters assured them gun walking wasn't going on, they took them at their word and adopted that false position as the official stance of the Justice Department.

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Darrell Issa

Issa's Suggestion Of Folding ATF's Duties Into FBI Probably Isn't Going Anywhere

Ryan J. Reilly | December 5, 2011, 12:03PM

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) suggested Friday that the role of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives could be folded into the FBI in the wake of ATF's botched Fast and Furious operation.

Issa's House Oversight Committee has been investigating Fast and Furious, the operation which let guns flow across the border into Mexico in the course of an investigation aimed at stopping gun trafficking.

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Eric Holder

'You Guys Are Behind This': Eric Holder Says Daily Caller Pushing For His Resignation

Ryan J. Reilly | November 29, 2011, 3:27PM

FBI Director Robert Mueller (Left) And U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder (Right)

Attorney General Eric Holder on Tuesday told a reporter with the conservative news website The Daily Caller that the news organization was ginning up calls for him to resign over ATF's botched Operation Fast and Furious.

The reporter approached Holder after an event at the White House on the federal government's efforts to combat counterfeit goods.

"You guys need to... you guys need to stop this," TPM heard Holder tell the reporter. "There's not an organic thing happening, you guys are behind this."

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Ted Stevens

DOJ Prosecutors Concealed Exculpatory Evidence Against Ted Stevens

Ryan J. Reilly | November 21, 2011, 11:57AM

Former Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK)

A lawyer appointed by a federal judge to investigate allegations of misconduct by Justice Department prosecutors handling the botched corruption case against the late Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) found "systematic concealment of significant exculpatory evidence" -- some of which was "willful and intentional" -- but is not recommending any criminal contempt charges.

The 500-plus page report by Henry F. Schuelke, III -- based on a review of 150,000 pages of documents, interviews with numerous witnesses and twelve depositions -- finds that the Stevens case was "permeated by the systematic concealment of significant exculpatory evidence which would have independently corroborated his defense and his testimony, and seriously damaged the testimony and credibility of the government's key witness," according to an excerpt released by U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan on Monday.

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Rahm Emanuel

Rahm Emanuel Used His Gmail Account to Message Administration Officials

November 15, 2011, 12:50PM

John Cook and Ryan Tate | Gawker

Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel used his private Gmail account to communicate with Attorney General Eric Holder during his time in the White House, according to the results of Freedom of Information Act request we filed.

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Frederick Thomas

Feds: Senior Citizen Militia Members Targeted Holder, McKinney

Ryan J. Reilly | November 10, 2011, 6:03AM

Federal prosecutors said Wednesday that four elderly militia members charged in a plot against citizens and federal employees were targeting Attorney General Eric Holder and former Rep. Cynthia McKinney as potential assassination targets.

Holder and McKinney's names were included on a hit list compiled by 73-year-old Frederick Thomas, federal prosecutors said at a bond hearing. Authorities also said Thomas had stockpiled 52 guns and 30,000 rounds of ammunition in his Georgia home. All four suspects pleaded not guilty.

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Ted Stevens

Senators Press Holder On Probe Of Ted Stevens Trial

Ryan J. Reilly | November 10, 2011, 6:00AM

Former Senator Ted Stevens (R-AK)

Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens (R) died 15 months ago. Two-and-a-half-years earlier, the federal corruption case against him was dropped due to allegations of prosecutorial misconduct. Now Attorney General Eric Holder says DOJ's internal investigators are "in the last stages of their examination" of what went wrong in the case and that a multi-hundred page report is on its way.

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Eric Holder

Holder: Voting Restriction Efforts 'Inconsistent' With American Values

Ryan J. Reilly | November 8, 2011, 2:14PM

Efforts to make it more difficult for voters to cast a ballot are inconsistent with American values and will be thoroughly investigated by DOJ's Civil Rights Division, Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday.

"This Department of Justice will be aggressive at looking at this jurisdictions that have attempted for whatever reason to restrict the ability of people to get to the polls," Holder said at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing.

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FBI

Holder: Anti-Muslim Training At FBI, DOJ Can 'Undermine' Outreach Efforts

Ryan J. Reilly | November 8, 2011, 1:20PM

Anti-Muslim training materials used by FBI and Justice Department personnel are "inconsistent" with DOJ's Muslim outreach efforts and can undermine such relationships, Attorney General Eric Holder said Tuesday.

Positions expressed in the materials -- including that all Muslims are likely terrorist sympathizers and that the Prophet Muhammad was a "cult leader" -- "do not reflect the views of the Justice Department and the FBI," Holder said.

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Eric Holder

Court Orders Trial Over Texas Redistricting Plan Signed By Rick Perry

Ryan J. Reilly | November 8, 2011, 1:15PM

Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R)

A panel of judges in Washington, D.C. has ordered that there should be a trial on the Texas redistricting maps signed by Gov. Rick Perry, denying the state's request to approve the maps DOJ argues limit the power of Hispanic voters.

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Eric Holder

Holder: Fast And Furious 'Not The Cause Of' U.S. Guns Flowing To Mexico (VIDEO)

Ryan J. Reilly | November 8, 2011, 11:50AM

Attorney General Eric Holder

In his opening statement before the Senate Judiciary Committee on Tuesday, Attorney General Eric Holder said that ATF's Fast and Furious operation was "a flawed response to, not the cause of, the flow of illegal guns from the United States into Mexico."

Holder said that "gun walking" was "unacceptable" and said Fast and Furious "was flawed in concept, as well as in execution."

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Chuck Grassley

Awkward: Grassley Blows Lid On Internal DOJ Probe Into Fast And Furious Leaks

Ryan J. Reilly | November 8, 2011, 11:30AM

Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA)

Updated: Nov. 8, 1:12PM

Attorney General Eric Holder confirmed on Tuesday that the Justice Department's internal investigators were looking into "a couple of leaks" related to ATF's flawed Operation Fast and Furious.

But he was pretty upset that Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) made the probe public in the first place.

In a hearing on Tuesday, Grassley related a private conversation that he had with Holder about a document that was supposed to be private that the Justice Department provided to the press. The name of the ATF agent was not deleted from the document, which Grassley said was a violation of the Privacy Act.

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Fast And Furious

Eric Holder: Politicians Playing 'Gotcha' Games On Fast And Furious

Ryan J. Reilly | November 7, 2011, 6:55PM

FBI Director Robert Mueller (Left) And U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder (Right)

Attorney General Eric Holder will tell the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday morning that ATF's Operation Fast and Furious was "flawed in concept, as well as in execution" and should never have happened, according to excerpts from his testimony released by the Justice Department on Monday evening.

But he will take a shot at Republican lawmakers for focusing on "headline-grabbing Washington 'gotcha' games and cynical political point scoring" instead of working with DOJ to make sure it doesn't happen again.

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Fast And Furious

NRA: Obama Let Guns Walk To Mexico To Crackdown On Gun Rights

Ryan J. Reilly | November 7, 2011, 1:56PM

Just how dedicated does the National Rifle Association think the Obama administration is to destroying the Second Amendment? The director of the organization thinks that DOJ gave weapons to Mexican drug cartels during Operation Fast and Furious in an effort to churn up support for changing gun laws.

National Rifle Association Director Wayne LaPierre -- who has also suggested that the fact that Obama has not cracked down on guns is just part of a long term scheme to actually crack down on guns -- has been recently floating the conspiracy theory that Fast and Furious was a way to impose stricter guns laws.

"It's the only thing that makes any sense," LaPierre told Newsmax. "Over a period of two or three years they were running thousands and thousands of guns to the most evil people on earth. At the same time they were yelling '90 per cent... of the guns the Mexican drug cartels are using come from the United States.'"

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Michael Mukasey

The Memo Bush AG Mukasey Got On ATF's 'Gun Walking'

Ryan J. Reilly | November 4, 2011, 1:20PM

Two days after former Attorney General Michael Mukasey took over as head of the Bush administration's Justice Department in 2007, he got a memo describing a failed effort by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to track weapons as they "walked" into Mexico.

TPM has obtained a copy of the memo, which was first reported on by Pete Yost of the Associated Press, which was turned over to the House Oversight Committee this week.

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Fast And Furious

DOJ's Breuer: I Shouldn't Have Just Trusted ATF To Stop 'Gun Walking' (VIDEO)

Ryan J. Reilly | November 1, 2011, 11:55AM

Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) questioned Justice Department official Lanny Breuer at a hearing on Tuesday about Attorney General Eric Holder's knowledge of ATF's flawed Operation Fast and Furious, the day after Breuer apologized for not connecting the "gun walking" tactics that took place during a Bush-era ATF operation to the more recent anti-gun trafficking operation.

Breuer said during his testimony that he trusted officials at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) to make sure that agents weren't allowing guns to "walk" across the Mexican border, as they learned happened back in 2006 and 2007 during Operation Wide Receiver.

"At the time, I thought that dealing with the leadership of ATF was sufficient and reasonable, and frankly given the amount of work I do, at the time I thought that was the appropriate way of dealing with it," Breuer said. "I thought we had dealt with it by talking to the ATF leadership."

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Justice Department

E-Mails Detail DOJ Concern Over ATF 'Gun Walking' Well Before 'Fast & Furious'

Ryan J. Reilly | October 31, 2011, 10:56PM

Chinese-made SKS rifle on counter at A & A Guns in Fairfax, Virginia.

A high-ranking Justice Department official was "stunned" when he learned in 2010 that agents with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed weapons to "walk" across the Mexican border during the Bush administration, according to recently disclosed documents.

Documents show that Deputy Assistant Attorney General Jason Weinstein, a career federal prosecutor in a leadership position within the Obama DOJ's Criminal Division, and other officials worked to keep the attention of the press away from the Bush-era "gun walking" tactics long before the problems with Operation Fast and Furious went public.

"Been thinking more about 'Wide Receiver I'," Weinstein wrote in an email on April 12, 2010. "ATF HQ [headquarters] should/will be embarrassed that they let this many guys walk -- I'm stunned, based on what we've had to do to make sure not even a single operable weapon walked in [undercover] operations I've been involved in planning -- and there will be press about that."

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Fast And Furious

Eric Holder To Testify On Fast And Furious As Dems Call On Ex-ATF Director Melson

Ryan J. Reilly | October 28, 2011, 2:50PM

Attorney General Eric Holder is set to testify before the House Judiciary Committee on Dec. 8 about ATF's flawed Fast and Furious operation that let guns flow to Mexican drug cartels, a Justice Department spokeswoman confirmed to TPM.

Holder has agreed to a request from Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) to testify before the Judiciary Committee, which is chaired by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), Oversight Committee Ranking Member Elijah E. Cummings (D-MD) said in a statement.

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COPS

CHART: Number Of Volunteers Performing Police Duties Triples

Ryan J. Reilly | October 24, 2011, 4:17PM

Volunteer civilians are increasingly filling police roles and nearly 12,000 police officers and sheriff's deputies will be laid off by the end of the year as local law enforcement agencies deal with budget cuts, according to a new report from DOJ's Community Oriented Policing Services (COPS) program. The study also shows the first-ever national decrease in law enforcement positions in the 25 years they've been collecting data.

"Across the country, mayors, sheriffs, and chiefs have been asked - not only to do more with less - but also to make painful budgetary cuts," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a speech on Monday. "According to a new economic outlook report that our COPS office released this week - we expect that, by the end of this year, nearly 12,000 police officers and sheriff's deputies will have been laid off."

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FBI

Documents Show FBI Targeted Communities Based On Race, Ethnicity

Ryan J. Reilly | October 20, 2011, 5:11PM

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) just released a massive trove of FBI documents indicating that anti-Muslim training materials have spread pretty far and wide within the bureau over the past several years and that analysts have been targeting areas based on racial and ethnic demographics.

It's all part of the ACLU's new "Mapping the FBI" initiative, which "aims to expose misconduct and abuse of authority by the bureau." They say the documents show that the FBI "has been targeting American communities for investigation based on race, ethnicity, national origin and religion" and that analysts "across the country are associating criminal behaviors with certain racial and ethnic groups and then using U.S. census data and other demographic information to map where those communities are located to investigate them."

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Islamophobia

DOJ Official: Holder 'Firmly Committed' To Eliminating Anti-Muslim Training

Ryan J. Reilly | October 19, 2011, 2:50PM

Attorney General Eric Holder

Attorney General Eric Holder is "firmly committed" to nixing anti-Muslim material from law enforcement training, former U.S. Attorney for the District of Oregon, Dwight C. Holton said Wednesday.

Holton, who was U.S. Attorney when the FBI arrested the so-called Christmas tree bomber, said that he spoke specifically with Holder about the "egregiously false" training that took place at the FBI's training headquarters at Quantico and at a U.S. Attorney's office in Pennsylvania, which was first reported on by Wired.

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ATF

Emails: Bush-Era Embassy, Prosecutor's Office Approved ATF 'Gun Walking' Tactic

Ryan J. Reilly | October 14, 2011, 5:00PM

As House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) continues to try to pin the flawed "gun walking" tactic employed in Operation Fast and Furious on the Obama administration, it's becoming increasingly clear that problems with ATF's Phoenix division date back at least into the Bush era.

TPM has obtained the documents relating to another Bush-era ATF operation (on top of Operation Wide Receiver) which deployed the "gun walking" tactic. The development was first reported by Pete Yost of the Associated Press.

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Darrell Issa

Despite Denials, Sources Say Darrell Issa Was Briefed On Details Of ATF's 'Fast And Furious'

Ryan J. Reilly | October 14, 2011, 9:15AM

House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) said this week that he was "never" briefed about what was going on in Operation Fast and Furious and that ATF agents who ran an April 2010 briefing he attended "never mentioned 'Fast and Furious' by name."

That contradicts contemporaneous documents prepared for that meeting as well as the claims of officials familiar with the briefing, who say Fast and Furious was, in fact, discussed in detail. Still, Issa's office says staffers at the meeting don't recall Fast and Furious coming up and say they weren't given the briefing materials.

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Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab

'Hey, Dude, Your Pants Are On Fire': 'Underwear Bomber' To Plead Guilty

Ryan J. Reilly | October 12, 2011, 10:20AM

Flight 253 bomb attack suspect Umar Abdulmutallab

Updated:Oct. 12, 12:42PM

Some breaking news from the trial of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab: the Nigerian man who allegedly tried to blow up an airplane with a bomb in his underwear plans to plead guilty, according to the Associated Press.

The development came on the second day of the trial. On Monday, witness Mike Zantow testified that he heard another passenger tell Abdulmatallab: "Hey, dude, your pants are on fire."

Jurors were supposed to hear from a flight attendant and other passengers on the December 2009 flight today.

Attorney General Eric Holder said the outcome proved that civilian courts could handle terrorism cases.

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DOJ

Did Iranian Regime Approve Plot To Have Mexican Drug Cartel Member Kill Saudi Arabian Ambassador?

Ryan J. Reilly | October 12, 2011, 6:00AM

FBI Director Robert Mueller (Left) And U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder (Right)

It's not everyday that the U.S. Attorney General and director of the FBI stand at a press conference and accuse military officials in a foreign country of plotting to assassinate an ambassador to the United States.

But that's just what happened Tuesday, when Attorney General Eric Holder and FBI Director Robert Mueller went before the cameras at the Justice Department and laid out the details of an alleged plot to kill the Saudi Arabian Ambassador, involving a Texas-based Iranian-American named Manssor Arbabsiar.

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Iran

Man Arrested In Saudi Ambassador Assassination Plot Had Cousin In Iranian Military

Ryan J. Reilly | October 11, 2011, 4:45PM

Saudi Ambassador To The U.S. Adel Al-Jubeir

It was thanks to a man who dodged a state-level narcotics offense by becoming a paid confidential source to the DEA that the feds stumbled upon an alleged plot by an Iranian official to assassinate the Saudi ambassador to the United States.

In a plan that federal officials described as "well-funded," "chilling" and out of the "pages of a Hollywood script," two men, allegedly working at the behest of elements of the Iranian military, plotted to hire a man they thought was affiliated with a Mexican drug cartel, to take out Saudi Arabian ambassador Adel A. Al-Jubeir, perhaps while he dined at a D.C. restraurant.

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Fast And Furious

DOJ: Issa's 'Recycled' Charges That Holder Lied About ATF's Fast And Furious Are 'Baseless'

Ryan J. Reilly | October 10, 2011, 3:19PM

The back-and-forth between House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa and Attorney General Eric Holder over Holder's knowledge of ATF's controversial Fast and Furious program continued Monday, with a Justice Department spokeswoman accusing Issa of "partisan showboating."

"These recycled allegations continue to be baseless, no matter how many times they are repeated," DOJ spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler told TPM in an email.

"From the start, the Attorney General took the concerns about certain tactics used in the Fast and Furious operation seriously, which is why the first steps he took were to ask the Inspector General to investigate the matter and to ensure agents and prosecutors knew such conduct violated Department of Justice policy and would not be tolerated," Schmaler said.

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Fast And Furious

Issa To Holder: Time 'To Come Clean' About Fast And Furious

Ryan J. Reilly | October 10, 2011, 1:50PM

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) sent a letter firing back at Attorney General Eric Holder, who had accused House Republicans of engaging in "political posturing" instead of trying to actually get to the bottom of what went wrong in ATF's Fast and Furious scandal.

"Incredibly, in your letter from Friday you now claim that you were unaware of Fast and Furious because your staff failed to inform you of information contained in memos that were specifically addressed to you," Issa wrote.

"At best, this indicates negligence and incompetence in your duties as Attorney General. At worst, it places your credibility into serious doubt," he continued.

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Fast And Furious

Eric Holder Bashes GOP's 'Political Posturing' In ATF Fast And Furious Scandal

Ryan J. Reilly | October 7, 2011, 5:23PM

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) and Attorney General Eric Holder

Attorney General Eric Holder said in a letter to Congress on Friday that the accusation that he lied about his knowledge of ATF's Fast and Furious program is irresponsible "political posturing."

Holder wrote that he could not "sit idly by" as Rep. Paul Gosar (R-AZ) "suggests, as happened this week, that law enforcement and government employees who devote their lives to protecting our citizens be considered 'accessories to murder.'"

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Operation Wide Receiver

Issa: We'll Get To The Bottom Of Bush's Gun Walking Program Too (VIDEO)

Ryan J. Reilly | October 5, 2011, 12:09PM

Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA)

House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) told Anderson Cooper on Tuesday that he'll "get to the bottom" of "Wide Receiver" -- the "gun walking" program that took place during the George W. Bush administration.

"What we do know about Wide Receiver somewhat is: very small amount of weapons, much more intensive following," Issa said. "But we will in fact get to the bottom of whether or not this practice might have began, in a smaller way, under the Bush watch. We're not putting it past any administration and giving anyone a pass."

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