Obama DOJ Refuses to Release Fast and Furious Docs

holder-leaks-.jpeg-1280x960The “most transparent administration in history” is once again revealing the rank hypocrisy of President Obama’s assessment. In a motion filed Monday night, lawyers from the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) asked U.S. District Court Judge Amy Berman Jackson to delay the transfer of documents related to the Fast and Furious gun-running scandal to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, until after her rulings requiring that transfer can be appealed to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. If their bid is successful, it could push the appeals process past the Obama administration’s time in office. In short, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is trying to run out the clock.

Last July, the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ordered the DOJ to turn over a “Vaughn index” of all Fast and Furious-requested documents sought by Judicial Watch, which had filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request in June 2012. The records sought by Judicial Watch were those withheld from the Oversight Committee when President Obama cited executive privilege in a transparent effort to protect his Attorney General. U.S. District Court Judge John D. Bates lifted the 16-month delay, despite contentions by the DOJ that turning over the records would interfere with litigation between the agency and the Oversight Committee, which had subpoenaed the same documents.

Bates’ ruling was clear:

In the [February 15, 2013] order granting the stay, this court explicitly noted that the DOJ ‘does not seek, and the court will not award, an indefinite stay pending ultimate resolution of the House Committee litigation,’ and  that ‘the benefits of delaying this case might well [become] too attenuated to justify any further delay …Because many of the issues to be resolved in this case do not overlap with the House committee, and because resolving those issues will not risk upsetting the delicate balance of powers in subpoena disputes between the political branches, the Court will require DOJ to produce a Vaughn index here.

Bates also noted that no court has ever “expressly recognized” the executive privilege claims made by Obama preventing these documents from being seen by Congress and the American public.

A month later, with the dispute now being adjudicated by Berman, the DOJ was also ordered to turn over a “privilege log,” a.k.a. a list of the documents being withheld. Both orders were supposed to be fulfilled by Oct. 1, 2014.

On Monday the DOJ made it clear they will make yet another attempt to defy both orders. “The Department respectfully submits that it would be preferable for the parties, this Court, and the D.C. Circuit — if an appeal were taken — to have any injunctive order await the conclusion of the district court litigation to allow for orderly and complete appellate proceedings,” DOJ lawyers wrote.

The additional documents run to 64,000 pages and relate directly to the operation that saw as many as 2000 firearms “walked” into Mexico — and into the hands of drug cartel leaders. These weapons have shown up at as many as 200 crime scenes in Mexico, and are responsible for the murder or wounding of approximately 300 Mexicans, including 14 Mexican teenagers who were killed, along with 12 wounded, during a birthday party in Ciudad Juarez in January 2010. F&F weapons were also used to murder Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was killed December 14, 2010 while on night patrol in the Arizona desert near the Mexican border, and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) Agent Jaime Zapata, who was killed on Feb. 15, 2011.

It is critical information about this trail of carnage the DOJ is desperately trying to suppress. Furthermore, as seen in the filing, The DOJ may withhold the documents regardless of the court order, claiming that because it “is clearly injunctive in nature, the Department would be entitled to appeal it as a matter of right.” The DOJ further insists that such an appeal was a “temporal request” aimed at avoiding “intermediate injunctive orders that could generate multiple piecemeal appeals.” If the Court doesn’t buy it, Holder and company want an extension to December 15, 2014, using the rationale that the Court has extended the deadline for producing the log until November 3, 2014.

It should be noted that the mid-term elections occur on Nov. 4. It should also be noted that the DOJ has stonewalled the Fast and Furious investigation for three years, despite numerous subpoenas issued by Oversight Committee chairman Darryl Issa (R-CA), who began issuing them shortly after the GOP gained control of the House in the 2010 election. By June 2011 the DOJ’s delaying tactics were so transparent, Issa began threatening Holder with contempt citations. On June 28, 2012, Holder became the first sitting Cabinet member in history to be held in contempt of Congress. The vote of 255-67 included 17 Democrats who supported the criminal contempt resolution.

Twenty-seven months later, nothing has changed. The DOJ continues to subvert the law, even as Democrats and their allies in the mainstream media continue to insist — as they do with every scandal afflicting the Obama administration — that the investigation amounts to little more than a politically-motivated witch hunt.

Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI) is approaching the problem in a different way. On Wednesday, he proposed completely eliminating the agency at the heart of the scandal. The ATF Elimination Act seeks to “abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives, transfer its functions relating to the Federal firearms, explosives, and arson laws, violent crime, and domestic terrorism to the Federal Bureau of Investigation, and transfer its functions relating to the Federal alcohol and tobacco smuggling laws to the Drug Enforcement Administration, and for other purposes.”

Sensenbrenner believes the benefits of the bill will be twofold, as in a chance to streamline government, and clean up a scandal-ridden agency. “Washington should be responsible stewards of the American taxpayers’ money,” he said in a statement about the bill. He continued:

While all too often that is not the case, this is a good government bill to streamline agency activity at DOJ—increasing effectiveness while decreasing cost. The ATF is a largely duplicative, scandal ridden agency that lacks a clear mission. It is plagued by backlogs, funding gaps, hiring challenges and a lack of leadership. For decades it has been branded by high profile failures. There is also significant overlap with other agencies. At a time when we are approaching $18 trillion in debt, waste and redundancy within our federal agencies must be addressed. Without a doubt, we can fulfill the role of the ATF more efficiently.

Eliminating a chunk of the Executive branch might be a cathartic response for the kind of stonewalling routinely employed by Holder and company, but it doesn’t eliminate the problem. The Obama administration abides one rule of governance above all else: we’re going to do whatever we want, and we dare someone to stop us.

Pick any scandal, be it Fast and Furious, Benghazi, the IRS targeting of conservatives, the lies at the heart of ObamaCare, the dropping of the Black Panther voter intimidation case, the seizing of AP reporter files, etc., etc., and the common thread is transparent. Aided and abetted by an in-the-tank mainstream media and see-no-evil Democrats, the Obama administration has employed an avalanche of lies, stonewalling, and disinformation aimed at producing one outcome: “scandal fatigue” among the American public.

Tragically, that strategy has been enormously successful. For the last six years, this administration has completely avoided anything resembling genuine accountability. For six years, everything has been “someone else’s fault.”

Three hundred dead and wounded Mexicans and two murdered American agents deserve better. Much better.

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  • Larry Larkin

    If the Judge has any integrity and guts various people at the DoJ should be heading off to do 40 days for contempt of court. Start slinging them behind bars for 40 days at a time and watch the documents come tumbling out.
    As long as they think they are teflon they’ll continue to show contempt.

    • Pete

      1. Release the documents.
      2. Mexico issues an arrest warrant.
      3. Democrat President refuses to extradite.
      4. Holder goes on vacation to Europe or South America.
      5. Holder gets arrested at the airport and extradited to Mexico.
      6. Holder does time in a Mexican prison. JUSTICE!

      • objectivefactsmatter

        Sounds like a great film that will never get made any time soon.

        I enjoy thinking about it though. Talk about your “social justice.”

      • ArmedAmerican

        Ive been fantasizing about Holder rotting in a Mexican prison cell for two years now.

    • Christopher Riddle

      He should be “Jailed”for CONTEMPT!!LORD Knows he’s”CONTEMPTIBLE”!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    • DB1954

      Don’t count on it. Judge Bermin-Jackson is an Obama appointee and a Harvard Law grad. Although she has shown some degree of independent thought from Obama’s usual federal judicial appointments, she hasn’t done anything yet to threaten to bring Obama’s corrupt house down.

      In addition to her probable sense of loyalty to the Democratic regime, I can seriously imagine that Judge Jackson has seriously considered what might happen to her if she were to order the DOJ to release the documents immediately. Names like Andrew Breitbart and Donald Young may cast a long dark shadow on her sense of fair play in this litigation. She’ll probably be able to easily find a reason in the law to give DOJ just a little more time. That is, if she knows what’s good for her. You think I’m joking? Think again.

  • Pete

    If they run out the clock on prosecution the documents still need to be released in 2 or more years time.

    It might affect their speaking fees.

    Out stature of limitations might have run out, but what about Mexico’s statute of limitations?

    Or the Hague?

    Eric Holder would look good in a Mexican prison?

    • DontMessWithAmerica

      An ISIS prison would be more gratifying.

  • kasandra

    So DOJ is appealing the decision of the U.S. District Court requiring DOJ to turn over the documents to Congress to the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit. If we recall, the Harry Reid just repealed the cloture rules in the Senate for judicial appointments so that it could add three radical judges to the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and tilt the ideological balance of that court to a 7 to 4 leftist majority. The additional three judge addition was unnecessary because the court already had the lowest case load per judge of any federal Circuit. But now they have the leverage to keep a decision from being issued on the documents while Obama/Holder are in office or even to reverse the District Court decision that the documents have to be turned over to Congress. It’s not for nothing that the administration packed this important Circuit Court. Thanks American voters. Behold your handiwork.

  • kafir4life

    President Stinky (BO) and his boy Eric earned some nice commissions on the sale of those guns, and had Brian Terry murdered when they learned he was going to turn whistleblower on the operation. The same thing happened to Ambassador Stevens when they learned he was going to blow the whistle on Stinky’s attempt to get weapons from Libya to his friends in ISIS.

    • Pete

      Here is the war it goes down.

      - You say arrest Eric Holder for the death for Brian Terry.
      - SlenderFella (aka DERP) says arrest the gun dealer who the Feds told to let the straw purchase take place.
      - So in the future gun dealer, who don’t want to be hung out to dry, start taping all dealings with the Feds.
      - The Feds get upset with the gun dealers & want to arrest them for protecting themselves. DERP say “Good!”

    • DB1954

      Sorry, but that’s the first allegation I’ve ever seen that Brian Terry was murdered for turning whistleblower. First of all, there’s no evidence that Terry had blown any whistle. That’s why it’s bullsh.

      As for Amb. Stevens, he didn’t have the opportunity to turn whistle blower. He was in Benghazi for the purpose of facilitating secret arms shipments to Hillary Clinton’s friends in the Muslim Brotherhood. She thought that would be a brilliant way to get arms to people she stupidly considered friends of the U.S.–i.e., the Muslim Brotherhood. Those MB friends murdered Stevens because they weren’t friends of the U.S. (duh?) as the Hillda-beast thought they were.

      In short, HRC let Stevens die so that no one could come back and finger her for her stupid ideas on how to conduct cloak and dagger spy operations. She fancied herself a regular 007, and when the Benghazi compound was attacked by people HRC trusted, she thought it best to let Stevens and others just die for their country in a nice, neat, and tidy package which would absolve her of all responsibility. But there’s no evidence she originally had the intention of killing Stevens. She simply let him be killed by issuing a stand-down order, which was ignored by the State Dept. security team, but the security team was too late to save the Ambassador.

      Obama and Holder aren’t smart enough to think up something like the business of murdering Brian Terry. Terry was murdered by Mexican drug cartel criminals. Obama and Holder are simply trying to cover it up.

      Don’t come in here with these wacky theories again, unless you want to be suspected of being a Dem-troll spreading misinformation.

  • http://banliberals.com/ Ban Liberals

    I’ll ask again: Why isn’t Eric Holder in jail?

    • Libslayer

      Obama protects Holder’s treachery.
      Holder protects Obama’s treachery.
      It’s a tag team of evil men.

    • objectivefactsmatter

      Because the DP are merely scofflaws on the very best of days.

    • WhiteHunter

      Well, because he himself is the “top law enforcement officer,” and won’t handcuff or indict himself, and certainly won’t appoint an independent special prosecutor. It’s exactly the same as when Al Capone had every cop, police captain, and judge in Chicago on the payroll–this “administration” is exactly the same kind of organized crime syndicate, rotten to the core and even more dangerous, since it controls the full, unlimited resources and intimidation power of the Federal government.

      I just hope that when we have a majority in both Houses, and a GOP president, they’ll do their duty and send these gangsters and all of their accomplices to prison, but I worry that they’ll wuss out, terrified of being called “racists” and “partisan witch-hunters,” and just “move on.” Disgustingly, that seems a lot more likely.

  • Libslayer

    The democrat party is a confederacy of con artists.
    And holder is a steaming pile.

  • Pete

    You misnamed yourself my good fella.

    Your appropriate moniker should “StupidFella

  • Pete

    Fast & Furious

  • Pete

    Ah another Lefty hitting all the non-Left sites like ClimateDepot Frontpage and others.

    You putting in the work son.

    • SlenderFeIla

      hi! sup?

  • 4USA2

    WHO in the real world CAN DEFY A SUBPEONA for records issued by THE USA Congress or a USA Court Judge? That is unheard of! Apparently … it seems Holder and Obama believe they are above the law. Let your Congressmen and women know that you WANT THE LAW ENFORCED NOW! We are a Nation of LAWS and this BS of thumbing your nose at OUR LAWS, has got to stop!

    • gnubi

      It is unjustifiable but apparently the MM and the left also believe the administration is above the law. Without the media’s assistance, it is difficult to engender the deserved outrage.

      • 4USA2

        CBS, NBC, ABC, and Public free television news ALL HAVE FACEBOOK, and/or Twitter pages and Websites. Maybe if THOUSANDS of us posted on their pages that the law in this country says you don’t go around defying Subpoenas like Holder is doing, and that we are all sick of their biased, cover-up reporting, etc. etc…. and that we blame this lawlessness on heavily on the media who are helping shred our Constitution; maybe some lightbulbs would go on? What really needs to happen is not so much that they lose viewers, but these networks need to lose their sponsors. How about we let sponsors know by not buying their products any more. We can boycott products. We all need to pursue options that we still can.
        Here’s a lulu …. There is a video now floating around the internet of John Kerry saying to the effect, the Senate and the House no longer matter in the running of this country….that TWO GREAT lawyers in the White House are NOW advising Obama on how to RUN THE COUNTRY. I didn’t quote that exact but I saw Kerry saying that in a video clip a couple days ago about the two GREAT lawyers in the WHITE HOUSE making decisions. WHO VOTED FOR TWO LAWYERS to make our country’s decisions???? Anybody? I sure didn’t. I voted for my Congressman in the last election, and other Conservative candidates. WHO voted for TWO LAWYERS to be in the WH making decisions for our country? ALL of US right now better let our State reps know we demand this country be run by the three bodies of elected officials that WE VOTED for…. in ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONSTITUTIONAL RUNNING OF OUR COUNTRY!

        • gnubi

          You’ve got my vote. I’ll try the FB TV news pages you suggested. Thanks.

  • Randy131

    It is often said that ‘Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied’, and in this case delaying past October 1, 2014 denies the American people and their representatives the truth, in order to keep the American people from then taking the appropriate action in their election process cycle to correct and get rid of those that break our laws, while supposedly serving to protect and enforce those same laws. These matters have been delayed for over three years now, and it is past time for the truth to be revealed and the DOJ’s cover-up of their actions that are believed to have violated our laws, and those guilty of these actions need to be revealed, and proper action taken to punish those responsible, to make sure nothing like this occurs again, and the laws of the USA are respected and enforced as the American people expect them to be, especially by those most responsible for doing so.

    • gnubi

      I agree, but In the meantime I will follow another common saying, “where there is smoke, there’s fire” and hold all dems running for office responsible for their complicity or unwillingness to hold their leaders to account.

      • Randy131

        I agree with you, because all Democrats put their political party first, then their constituents next, and then our country last. I’m not going to say the Republicans are that much better, because in the Republican Party there are RINOs that do the same things as Democrats do, but there are many good Republicans that do live by conservative principles and philosophies, but they are mostly and mainly ‘Tea Party’ Republicans. But good or bad, I’d rather see Republicans in office so at least the American people get a chance for themselves and their country to come first with our Congressional representatives.

        • DB1954

          RINOs are bad, but I’m not prepared to say that they are to a man, treasonous. In my view, all, meaning each and every Democrat in the Congress is a traitor. By traitor, I mean just that. They’re traitors and criminals. Every single one is guilty of treason or complicity in treason.

  • Pete

    It is cheaper the other way around. He should serve his sentences handed down by Mexican courts 1st.

  • weirdpeter

    Looks like it’s time to crash some hard drives.

  • shinny_head

    The ATF has a long history of bad behavior that has caused a lot of deaths directly or indirectly. Some examples are Ruby Ridge, the raid on the Branch Davidians compound, and “storefront operations.” There are many more examples known and unknown. If the ATF were disbanded, the same people will be moved to another agency to continue their attack on the “right to bare arms.” Most of the egregious behavior occurs under Democratic Party rule.
    The modern DP wants to install a totalitarian state in the USA.

    The new name of the USA will be the Progressive Caliphate of North America,
    PCNA.

    • claspur

      Both Ruby Ridge and Branch Davidian raids were conducted by the FBI, not the ATF.

      • WhiteHunter

        Sorry, but not so. The Waco massacre was (initially) a BATF operation that was supposed to bolster the department’s large budget request with an impressive “show of force” against what was expected to be a soft target. The ninja-clad stormtroopers who swarmed out of their cattle cars at the compound, expecting an easy slaughter, were all BATF. It was only after that that the FBI arrived with tanks, attack helicopters, and poison gas that the humiliated BATF took a back seat and left the killing to the real professionals, who proved themselves fully the equals of the German SS who “liquidated” the Warsaw Ghetto.

        Ruby Ridge was a mixed operation; the initial killers who were sent to assassinate Randy Weaver and his family were actually U.S. Marshals who apparently wanted some trigger time. One of them murdered Weaver’s 13-year-old son, along with the boy’s dog, as the two walked unsuspecting in the woods next to the cabin. Moments later, he himself was accidentally shot dead by his partner with a bullet through the back. Guess he’d never heard of the safety rule about keeping your finger off the trigger and your gun pointed in a safe direction. Of course, the specifics of who did what exactly when and where will always be a bit murky, since Federal agents later tampered with, moved, and destroyed evidence (like the spent brass) to cover up their crimes (as they also did at Waco).

        FBI snipers soon arrived to besiege the terrified Weaver surivors, and one of them, by the name of Lon Horiuchi, murdered Weaver’s wife Vicki with an easy shot through the forehead from a mere 200 yards away–a piece of cake for a trained assassin like him.

        • claspur

          Thanks for that clarification.

  • Christopher Riddle

    (Outside of his SKIN-COLOR),Why isn’t this”Scofflaw”making”Little Ones From Big Ones”?????

  • zeus234

    OK, if the DOJ wants to run the clock out till after elections it needs to be made plain they will hang just as high if not higher. All concerned.

  • DB1954

    Because he doesn’t want to go to jail? At present, he’s the “decider.”

  • USARetired

    The firest order of business should have been to dispose Holder!

  • wwwashingtondo

    I am glad to see a judge forcing their hand.. However, this ‘vaughn” index is really just a list as far as I can tell. I cant imagine how long it will take to get the documents listed.. several more years. Obama, and this nation will be long gone by the time the truth is revealed. Hate to be a debbie downer, just saying.

  • ArmedAmerican

    “The only people who don’t want to disclose the truth are people with something to hide” -Barrack Hussein Obama

  • ArmedAmerican

    One thing is certain….Holder has something on Obama and Big Zero knows it.