DHS Fast and Furious OIG report fed to Los Angeles Times, not to public
Will media now claim report 'exonerates' Napolitano?
Credits:
Alex Wong/Getty Images
The Department of Homeland Security's long-awaited Office of Inspector General report on Operation Fast and Furious “gunwalking” has been obtained by The Los Angeles Times, Richard Serrano reported Thursday.
“ATF agents asked their Border Patrol counterparts not to pursue criminal leads or track gun smuggling in southern Arizona so they could follow the firearms themselves, and senior Homeland Security agents ‘complied and the leads were not investigated,’” Serrano writes.
“The report … also said that a Homeland Security special agent on the border was collaborating with the ATF in Fast and Furious, but his ‘senior leaders’ in Arizona never read his updates about fundamental flaws with the failed gun tracking operation,” The Times story continues. “Had they done so, Homeland Security officials could have tried to close down the operation before one of their Border Patrol agents, Brian Terry, was killed not far from Tucson.”
In other words, per their narrative, it was all local and never made it up the operational command chain through Arizona, let alone to Washington. But all the public has to go on to verify that, at this point, is The Times report. And while finding a copy of the OIG report, which is not included with his story, should be of import -- not just for wider public scrutiny, but also for legislative oversight -- it appears to be something that hasn’t registered on anyone else’s radar yet.
That should be surprising and a cause for concern, as opposed to something most aren’t even aware of, let alone seriously looking into. Last November, this column was a lone voice following up and expressing concern about where the DHS OIG report was, especially since it had been reported several months earlier that DHS had told Congressional staffers to expect the report in October.
Of course, this column had also been a lonely voice in asking where the Department of Justice OIG report was once it passed the Warren Commission milestone, and again raised concerns when that document -- which admitted key witnesses refused to speak to investigators and key documents had not been available to auditors -- was finally released last September, resulting in undisguised administration media supporters calling it an exoneration for Eric Holder.
So while knowing the DHS report has been completed can at least be viewed as a needed step -- albeit a bafflingly slow one -- the official and media silence over its completion does not lend itself to confidence in the administration’s self-proclaimed transparency.
Cases in point: There is nothing about this report on the DHS “Press releases” page; nor on the DHS blog; nor does anything appear in the DHS/OIG press release page; there is nothing about it on their Border Security page; and importantly, it is not yet linked to on the OIG Reports: Fiscal Year 2013 page.
Of equal concern is the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform “Releases” page, which shows no awareness of the DHS OIG report, let alone any responsive activity scheduled to question it.
That the report exists, but that Americans are forced to rely on The Los Angeles Times’ interpretation of what it says rather than being able to read it for themselves, should be something that concerns citizens and legislators alike -- particularly after seeing how an administration operative who dismissed the Holder bar complaint as “specious [and] frivolous” was the same one feeding Fast and Furious talking points to the ultra-left Media Matters.
Whether Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa will now schedule a hearing for DHS OIG Charles K. Edwards, as he did with DOJ OIG Michael Horowitz, has not been announced. With the way Attorney General Eric Holder is continuing his stonewalling in court, and with his defiant disrespect for those demanding unequivocal answers (which, if his rationale applies must include the survivors of slain Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry), Issa needs to leave no stone unturned in pursuit of the truth.
UPDATE: The report is here, apparently released without fanfare, as news searches plus the internal DHS links yielded no results, as indicated by the links in this column. A Google search for its title, "DHS Involvement in OCDETF Operation Fast and Furious," supported by a screenshot of the search results page indicates it was posted "3 hours ago."
Thanks to James Simpson for the find.
Note this update originally and incorrectly said the report was published on Mar. 13 and that was up for several minutes before I realized and corrected it. The report gives today's date. I apologize for my error made in haste.
------------
If you're a regular Gun Rights Examiner reader and believe it provides news and perspectives you won't find in the mainstream media, please subscribe to this column and help spread the word by sharing links, promoting it on social media like Facebook (David Codrea) and Twitter (@dcodrea), and telling your like-minded friends about it. And for more commentary, be sure to visit "The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance."
“ATF agents asked their Border Patrol counterparts not to pursue criminal leads or track gun smuggling in southern Arizona so they could follow the firearms themselves, and senior Homeland Security agents ‘complied and the leads were not investigated,’” Serrano writes.
“The report … also said that a Homeland Security special agent on the border was collaborating with the ATF in Fast and Furious, but his ‘senior leaders’ in Arizona never read his updates about fundamental flaws with the failed gun tracking operation,” The Times story continues. “Had they done so, Homeland Security officials could have tried to close down the operation before one of their Border Patrol agents, Brian Terry, was killed not far from Tucson.”
In other words, per their narrative, it was all local and never made it up the operational command chain through Arizona, let alone to Washington. But all the public has to go on to verify that, at this point, is The Times report. And while finding a copy of the OIG report, which is not included with his story, should be of import -- not just for wider public scrutiny, but also for legislative oversight -- it appears to be something that hasn’t registered on anyone else’s radar yet.
That should be surprising and a cause for concern, as opposed to something most aren’t even aware of, let alone seriously looking into. Last November, this column was a lone voice following up and expressing concern about where the DHS OIG report was, especially since it had been reported several months earlier that DHS had told Congressional staffers to expect the report in October.
Of course, this column had also been a lonely voice in asking where the Department of Justice OIG report was once it passed the Warren Commission milestone, and again raised concerns when that document -- which admitted key witnesses refused to speak to investigators and key documents had not been available to auditors -- was finally released last September, resulting in undisguised administration media supporters calling it an exoneration for Eric Holder.
So while knowing the DHS report has been completed can at least be viewed as a needed step -- albeit a bafflingly slow one -- the official and media silence over its completion does not lend itself to confidence in the administration’s self-proclaimed transparency.
Cases in point: There is nothing about this report on the DHS “Press releases” page; nor on the DHS blog; nor does anything appear in the DHS/OIG press release page; there is nothing about it on their Border Security page; and importantly, it is not yet linked to on the OIG Reports: Fiscal Year 2013 page.
Of equal concern is the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform “Releases” page, which shows no awareness of the DHS OIG report, let alone any responsive activity scheduled to question it.
That the report exists, but that Americans are forced to rely on The Los Angeles Times’ interpretation of what it says rather than being able to read it for themselves, should be something that concerns citizens and legislators alike -- particularly after seeing how an administration operative who dismissed the Holder bar complaint as “specious [and] frivolous” was the same one feeding Fast and Furious talking points to the ultra-left Media Matters.
Whether Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa will now schedule a hearing for DHS OIG Charles K. Edwards, as he did with DOJ OIG Michael Horowitz, has not been announced. With the way Attorney General Eric Holder is continuing his stonewalling in court, and with his defiant disrespect for those demanding unequivocal answers (which, if his rationale applies must include the survivors of slain Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry), Issa needs to leave no stone unturned in pursuit of the truth.
UPDATE: The report is here, apparently released without fanfare, as news searches plus the internal DHS links yielded no results, as indicated by the links in this column. A Google search for its title, "DHS Involvement in OCDETF Operation Fast and Furious," supported by a screenshot of the search results page indicates it was posted "3 hours ago."
Thanks to James Simpson for the find.
Note this update originally and incorrectly said the report was published on Mar. 13 and that was up for several minutes before I realized and corrected it. The report gives today's date. I apologize for my error made in haste.
------------
If you're a regular Gun Rights Examiner reader and believe it provides news and perspectives you won't find in the mainstream media, please subscribe to this column and help spread the word by sharing links, promoting it on social media like Facebook (David Codrea) and Twitter (@dcodrea), and telling your like-minded friends about it. And for more commentary, be sure to visit "The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance."
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