(Ken Silva, Headline USA) The whistleblower advocacy group Empower Oversight released shocking allegations Wednesday that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives has drafted a 1,300-page document attempting to justify a rule pursuing citizens for the private sale of firearms.
🚨🚨🚨 @EMPOWR_us has learned through whistleblowers within ATF that at the direction of the White House, ATF has drafted a 1,300 page document to justify a rule effectively banning the private sale of firearms. 🧵
— Tristan Leavitt (@tristanleavitt) January 31, 2024
Citing sources within the ATF, Empower Oversight said the document is reportedly being overseen by Senior Policy Counsel Eric Epstein, who worked as the Phoenix Field Office’s Division Counsel during Operation Wide Receiver—a precursor of Operation Fast and Furious, which saw the ATF flooding the streets with illegal guns as part of a supposed investigation into organized crime.
“The fact that inside ATF sources are blowing the whistle on this draft rule is an indication of what a difficult position it would put the ATF in. ATF agents did not sign up to go after law-abiding citizens for private sales protected under the Second Amendment of the Constitution,” said Empower Oversight President Tristan Leavitt.
Leavitt wrote an open letter to Attorney General Merrick Garland and ATF Director Steven Dettelbach, expressing concerns about their gun-grabbing plot.
“Such an expansive rule that treats all private citizens the same as federal firearms licensees would circumvent the separation of powers in the Constitution, which grants ‘all legislative Powers’ to Congress while requiring that the President ‘take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.’ To the extent such a rule prevents the private sale of firearms, it would also clearly violate the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution,” Leavitt’s letter said.
“Nor would such a rule only hurt law-abiding firearms owners,” he said.
“The lessons of the Ruby Ridge and Waco standoffs should make clear that attempting to enforce such an expansive regulation could endanger countless ATF field agents who are forced to serve as the face of the Biden Administration in going after private firearms owners for constitutionally-protected firearms sales.”
Empower Oversight has filed a Freedom of Information Act for more details about the impending ATF regulation. The group seeks all internal government communications about the regulation, including any emails using the terms “ban,” “private sale,” “universal background,” and “gun control.”
Ken Silva is a staff writer at Headline USA. Follow him at twitter.com/jd_cashless.
