Washington -
At a time when public confidence in the institutions of government is at an all-time low, it is imperative we act to restore public trust.
One institution that should be above politics is the United States Department of Justice. The Department of Justice should be fair and impartial because our republic needs to have confidence in the civil and criminal justice systems.
From the time of Greek antiquity, and even including modern images, Lady Justice is blindfolded. She is blindfolded because she shouldn’t see the gender, race, socioeconomic status or political persuasions of those before her.
As a former employee of the Department of Justice, I take no joy in criticizing the department. The overwhelming majority of the employees are honest, hardworking women and men who have dedicated their lives to upholding the law. But when politics creeps into the Department of Justice, people lose confidence and there are serious consequences attendant thereto.
The botched gun-trafficking investigation, commonly known as “Fast and Furious,” has consumed much time and attention of two of the committees I serve on in Congress. “Fast and Furious” was ostensibly calculated to apprehend guns headed to Mexican drug cartels. It was flawed in its inception and execution.
To be sure, I worked with ATF agents for 16 years. The ATF agents I worked with in South Carolina were honest, brave, hardworking men and women who would never allow guns to “walk” into the hands of criminals.
“Fast and Furious” was an Arizona investigation that failed so dramatically that over 1,000 firearms were “lost” and are currently unaccounted for. Two of the weapons were found at the murder scene of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, and other weapons have been implicated in the deaths of hundreds of Mexican citizens on the other side of the border.
Fast and Furious was ill-conceived and ill-executed. Any investigation that relies on “gun-walking” and the recovery of guns at crime scenes is so fundamentally flawed that whoever approved it needs to be disciplined.
The House Committees on Judiciary and Government Reform and Oversight have been investigating “Fast and Furious” for over a year. It is clear that officials at Main Justice in Washington, D.C., were aware of the “gun walking” tactic and failed to stop it. It is also clear that Attorney General Eric Holder has not produced all relevant and material information to Congress so that we can adequately investigate what happened and take steps to ensure it never happens again.
Politics are everywhere in Washington. That much we know. But surely the Department of Justice should be above politics. Surely we can have a top law enforcement official we trust. Surely we ought to have a Department of Justice that inspires trust and confidence in the people it purports to serve. That is our goal.
Our investigation into “Fast and Furious” will not end until we have answers to all our questions and until we can safely assure the people we work for that never again will such risks be taken with the lives of our citizens or those of any other country.
