By US Daily Review Staff.
The events unfolding when it comes to the controversial policy of the Department of Justice called “Fast and Furious” are looking increasingly like a dramatic novel. The Chairman of the House Oversight committee, Darrell Issa, is now openly accusing Attorney General Eric Holder of lying and he now has the wiretaps to prove it.
Read Chairman Issa’s dramatic letter:
“On February 8, 2012, Senator Grassley, Congressman Meehan and I wrote to you requesting the Department’s assistance in obtaining the wiretap applications from Operation Fast and Furious,” Issa wrote to Holder. “We did so because we believed their contents would shed additional light on senior Department officials’ level of knowledge of the unacceptable tactics used in Fast and Furious.”
“Other than having acknowledged receipt of the letter, the Department has not responded to the February 8 request,” Issa continued. “In a May 15, 2012 letter, the Deputy Attorney General reiterated the Department’s position that the ‘inappropriate tactics used in Fast and Furious … were not initiated of authorized by Department leadership in Washington.’” He goes on to say “We now know that statement is false.” Also, Issa said the wiretap applications “were approved by senior Justice Department officials in March, April, May, June and July 2010.”
“Each application included a memorandum from Assistant Attorney General Lanny A. Breuer to Paul M. O’Brien, Director, Office of Enforcement Operations, authorizing the wiretap applications on behalf of the Attorney General,” Issa wrote to Holder. “The memoranda from Breuer are marked specifically for the attention of Emory Hurley, the lead prosecutor for Operation Fast and Furious.”
Issa said these wiretap applications prove senior DOJ officials’ continued denial of having been aware of the tactics used in Fast and Furious “to be false and misleading.”
Issa then cites several instances in which Holder himself provided statements about Fast and Furious that Issa said Congress now knows “are not accurate.”
Issa said Holder’s comments at a Sept. 7, 2011, press conference, an Oct. 7, 2011 letter he wrote to Congress and two different instances where he testified before different congressional committees — testimony he gave to the Senate Judiciary Committee on Nov. 8, 2011, and to the House Oversight Committee on Feb. 2, 2012, were incorrect.
In each of those statements, Holder denied the fact that senior Department of Justice officials were aware of gun-walking tactics used in Fast and Furious.
“We now know all that all of these statements are not accurate,” Issa wrote to Holder.
“The remarkable level of detail about these objectionable tactics contained in the applications renews concerns that senior Department officials failed to perform their jobs,” Issa continued. “It also raises concerns about the veracity of your testimony before Congress, and the accuracy of recent letters sent to Congress by senior Department officials.”
“Not insignificantly, this is not the first time that the Department presented inaccurate information to Congress during this investigation,” Issa added. “Having seen the wiretap applications, we now know that the information coming from the Department has been misleading. That must stop.”
Read the letter in its entirety here.
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