“New documents obtained by CBS News show Attorney General Eric Holder was sent briefings on the controversial Fast and Furious operation as far back as July 2010. That directly contradicts his statement to Congress,” m.cbsnews.com reports. “On May 3, 2011, Holder told a Judiciary Committee hearing, ‘I’m not sure of the exact date, but I probably heard about Fast and Furious for the first time over the last few weeks.’ Yet internal Justice Department documents show that at least ten months before that hearing, Holder began receiving frequent memos discussing Fast and Furious.” [Click here to watch the CBS story.] Holder now claims he “misunderstood” the “when did you first know about F&F” question . . .

Well he would say that, wouldn’t he? Lying to a Congressional committee is called perjury, an offense for which Holder may be impeached and, yes, prosecuted. His career is toast and his peeps are in full damage control mode. In the last few hours, they’ve offered three excuses for his demonstrably false testimony.

According to the CBS report, Holder’s reps say their boss thought Representative Issa was asking if knew about “details” of the operation, not the operation’s existence. Over at foxnews.com: the Holderites claimed the U.S. Attorney General doesn’t read all the memos updating ongoing ops. And then there’s this:

In response to the documents released today, the Justice Department said Holder’s response referred to when he first learned of the “troubling tactics” of the program. A Justice spokesperson also says that the “gun walking” referred to in the October 2010 email exchange is about another case initiated before Operation Fast and Furious.

That would be ATF Operation Wide Receiver, which let some 400 guns walk between 2006 to 2008. Allegedly.

Anyway, the U.S. Attorney General lied about his knowledge of Operation Fast and Furious, wherein the ATF helped put weapons into the hands of drug thugs who killed a U.S. Border Patrol Agent and an Immigrations and Customs Enforcement Agent. And each other. And Mexican civilians. All with ATF-enabled guns.

On the face of it, the Attorney General’s perjury was a simple attempt to avoid responsibility for the ATF’s gunwalking strategy (if you want to call it that). Beyond that, Holder’s “I know nothink!” reply to Issa’s inquiry relieved the U.S. Attorney General of the need to answer more specific questions about Operation Fast and Furious. Such as why the ATF let guns walk across the border and into the hands of narco-terrorists.

The MSM is still on-board with the whole “botched sting” explanation; Bob Schieffer’s intro talks about Fast and Furious going “badly wrong.” The Wall Street Journal observes that “the aim was to prosecute top traffickers.” But it can’t be emphasized enough: the ATF’s “plan” to let guns walk was never going to lead to arrests.

How could it? It couldn’t. There was no attempt to “follow the guns” into Mexico, nor could there be given A) America has no jurisdiction within Mexico and B) nobody told the Mexicans. Allegedly.

As we’ve said before, Fast and Furious (and Operation Wide Receiver, Operation Castaway, and grenadewalker) armed the U.S. and Mexican government-backed Sinaloa drug cartel against Los Zetas. According to previous testimony, the ATF’s F&F was aided and abetted by the IRS, FBI, DEA, DOJ, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and various White House security folk.

Someone should ask Mr. Holder about this statement [via narcosphere.narconews.com] by the captured Sinaloa jefe who claims the U.S. Federal government turned a blind eye to his cartel’s billion dollar (per month) drug smuggling business

Mr. Zambada Niebla believes that the documentation that he requests [from the US government] will confirm that the weapons received by Sinaloa Cartel members and its leaders in Operation ‘Fast & Furious’ were provided under the agreement entered into between the United States government and [Sinaloa organization lawyer] Mr. Loya Castro on behalf of the Sinaloa Cartel.

If that’s true, if the document sees the light of day, the Gunwalker scandal will blow up big. “Obama administration in bed with ruthless Mexican drug cartel.” Iran Contra that. The resulting scandal could well bring down the Obama administration.

Or not. The President could dodge the ATF-shaped bullet by laying his cards on the table. “We did what we had to do to support the popularly elected government of Mexico. Operation Fast and Furious, while dangerous, was part of that effort. An effort that’s succeeding (as if).”

Or not X2. The Administration could try to suppress the truth about their pro-Sinaloa Mexican strategy without coming clean, throwing a “national security” blanket over everything, from Fast and Furious to the fact that the CIA’s still targeting Zetas over Sinaloas.

In any event, a Fast and Furious Special Prosecutor is now inevitable. Holder’s perjury completely discredits the administration’s internal investigation (through the Office of Inspector General) and flags the fact that the DOJ has more skeletons than A Nightmare Before Christmas. Clearly, Holder’s homies have something to hide, and it’s more than Holder hide.

No matter how this plays out, play out it will. And TTAG will be here to tell the truth about the ATF-enabled guns.

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18 COMMENTS

  1. For all practical purposes, Mexico is realistically in the limited early stages of a civil war. The government and people basically thrown together on one side fighting against or being terrorized by the Cartels. Essentially, the USG (Obama, Hillary, Holder, and others have to take responsibility) intentionally and actively armed the Cartels ie the enemies of Mexico’s government and people.

  2. How was this supposed to work, anyway?

    They ‘walk’ some guns accross the border.
    Guns get sold to some middleman.
    Guns get sold to some Los Zetas.
    Guns go through some narcoadventures.
    Guns get taken by the Gulf Cartel in a hit.
    More adventures.
    The Marina-Armadas take guns from Gulf Cartel.
    Gun lands on a photo table next to goat horns and coca bricks.
    Federales diligently work round the clock and track the gun all the way back through it’s adventures, to, …. the guy who walked it accross the border. Who got it from the ATF. Because, you know, Los Zetas and Gulfos keep accurate ledgers of all their firearm transactions with serial numbers. Crime solved. The ATF did it.

    • How was this supposed to work, anyway?

      Pick one:
      A) Nobody knows.
      2) It wasn’t.
      iii) What ‘r’ ya’ talkin’ about? It worked like a charm.

  3. “…about why the ATF let guns walk across the border and into the hands of narco-terrorists…”

    Just to be clear, the ATF didn’t let these guns walk (that implies turning a blind eye), they made them walk – that was the explicit goal of this crime.

    Just like we are slowly and successfully eradicating the “botched sting” description of this crime, the next anti-spin step is to replace “the ATF let guns walk” with “the ATF bought guns with taxpayer funds and sold them to Mexican cartels” or something along those lines.

    Thanks for reporting and keeping this front and center.

  4. When did clearly and obviously lying under oath to a congressional committee become OK? “When did you know about Operation Fast & Furious?” is as simple as sentence construction gets.

    Obama not firing him immediately speaks volumes.

  5. I always felt that if you do something bad you stick your hand up and say sorry. Does this get whipped out of people during ‘Politian 101’?

  6. I’ll changed the old song just for Holder

    “I turned 54 in prison doin’ life without parole, I got only me to blame cuz Mama tried”

  8. Probably?

    More likely “probably not.”

    Holder’s use of “probably” is the testimonial equivalent of Pres. Clinton’s tortured “well that depends on what the definition of ‘is’ is”.

    Probably was definitely a hedge.

  10. ” Holder lied….”
    What? A political puppet(ier) lied? No that’s not possible. Unheard of. Unbelievable! Diabolical! Never happened.
    MSM needs to catch up we’ve been ahead of that curve.
    BTW Holder, if he had any(you know whats) should be hung by them along with Melson and their other cohorts involved in this fiasco.
    FAST and FURIOUS?! F U B A R!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

  11. I’m curious if Holder took an oath before his testimony; and, if so, what the oath was. I know that oaths to be truthful aren’t always taken for congressional testimony–it is assumed that people will be truthful–but if he did take an oath pledging to tell “the whole truth,” specifically, then there’s no way to swing his testimony as anything but perjurious.

  12. The Administration could try to suppress the truth about their pro-Sinaloa Mexican strategy without coming clean, throwing a “national security” blanket over everything

    The Administration already has. Niebla’s document subpeona is being fought on the basis of “national security,” among other things. The guts of Niebla’s claim of immunity is an agreement with the CIA. The Administration denies that there was an agreement and also claims that even if there was one, it’s unenforceable by Niebla since the CIA had no power to enter into such an agreement.

    Meanwhile, since Niebla is a top-tier commander of the Sinaloa cartel and is now in US custody, the US has leverage over the Sinaloas that it does not have over Los Zetas. Yet another reason why the Administration figures that the Sinaloa cartel is “our” dog in this fight.

  13. The only thing that’ll make me happier then watching Holder being raked over the coals for this would be if a White House accountant came forward and told American where the President has stashed his payout from the Solyndra loan.

    That said, I can only hope Holder will start singing like a canery after contemplating swapping spit with Bubba in lockup.

    BTW; I’d like to show my appreciation to CBS for not sharing in the Democratic Party hubris.

  14. Mr. Holden is morally unqualified to be Attorney General. He is also a lying sack of crap. Thank you and have a great day!

  15. Perjury is not excused by claiming you didn’t understand the question. Especially when it’s clear you did. And you’re banking on subordinates taking one for the team.
    Allendale or Lewisburg are both fine facilities with courteous staff and decent food. Located a few hours from DC, his family can visit frequently.

  16. I am still amazed the whole scumbag crew of the big 0 isn’t swinging from a tree yet.
    When will enough be enough?

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