Recommending that Attorney General Eric Holder Be Found in Contempt of Congress
Floor Speech
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Mr. ISSA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 2 minutes.
I never thought that we would be here today. I never thought this point would come. Throughout 18 months of investigation, through countless areas of negotiations in order to get the minimum material necessary to find out the facts behind Fast and Furious and the murder of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, I always believed that, in time, we would reach an accommodation sufficient to get the information needed for the American people while at the same time preserving the ongoing criminal investigations.
I am proud to say that our committee has maintained the ability for the Justice Department to continue their ongoing prosecutions. Neither the majority nor the minority has allowed any material to become public to compromise that. However, the facts remain--in Fast and Furious, the Department of Justice permitted the sale of more than 2,000 weapons that fell into the hands of the Mexican drug cartels, which was both reckless and inexcusable. And it clearly was known by people, both career professionals and political appointees, from the lowliest members on the ground in Phoenix to high-ranking officials in the Department of Justice. But that's not what we're here for today.
Today we are here on a very narrow contempt, one that the Speaker of the House, in his wisdom and assistance, has helped us to fashion. Let it be clear: we still have unanswered questions on a myriad of areas related to Operation Fast and Furious. But today we are only here to determine how, over the 10 months from the time in which the American people and the Congress of the United States were lied to, given false--literally the reverse statement, that ``no guns were allowed to walk'' during those 10 months before the Justice Department finally owned up and recognized that they had to come clean that, in fact, Fast and Furious was all about gunwalking.
The Department of Justice maintained a series of documents. Many of these documents are believed to be communications between and with the very individuals at the heart of the decision to go forward with Fast and Furious. Therefore, we have focused our limited contempt on those documents. If our committee is able to receive the documents in totality that show who brought about the dishonest statement to Congress and who covered it up for 10 months, we believe that will allow us to backtrack to the individuals who ultimately believed in Fast and Furious, facilitated Fast and Furious, and ultimately made it responsible for Brian Terry's death.
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Mr. ISSA. I yield myself an additional 15 seconds.
I won't read everything that's in my opening statement. But I will read just one more thing.
These words were said on the House floor in 2008 when Speaker Pelosi supported contempt. She said:
Congress has the responsibility of oversight of the executive branch. I know that Members on both sides of the aisle take that responsibility very seriously. Oversight is an institutional obligation to ensure against abuse of power. Subpoena authority is a vital tool for that oversight.
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Mr. ISSA. Mr. Speaker, the minority knows that, in fact, this contempt is all about the Attorney General's refusal to turn over documents, not whether or not it was his lieutenants or he that personally was involved in Fast and Furious.
With that, I yield 2 minutes to the distinguished former chairman of the Judiciary Committee, the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Sensenbrenner).
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Mr. ISSA. I yield myself 10 seconds, and have no doubt that the gentleman will walk off the floor. But his motion is asking us also to delay, into an election, getting an answer for the Terry family. I know that is not the wise course, and I strongly support that we do this today.
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Mr. ISSA. Mr. Chairman, I'm sure that the gen tle lady from New York recognizes that the right of a minority hearing has not been exercised, and that would have answered the questions, as they are well aware, about bringing Kenneth Melson before the committee. That would be their right. They did not exercise their right.
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Mr. ISSA. I yield myself 15 seconds.
I respect my colleague from California, as we came in to Congress together some 12 years ago; but the fact is he talked about everything except the fact that Congress was lied to in a false letter and follow-up statement. Ten months went by. We're only asking for the information related to the false statements made to Congress during that intervening period and nothing more.
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Mr. ISSA. As I know the former Speaker of the House knows, the Attorney General is being held in contempt as the custodian of the records for refusing to deliver them, and not because we got to choose how far up or not to go.
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Mr. ISSA. I would recognize myself for 10 seconds.
The distinguished gentleman from Maryland can have an opinion, but he can't have his facts.
Fast and Furious was an OCDETF operation that began under President Obama and Attorney General Holder. No ifs, no ands, no buts. And I would trust that the gentleman would no longer make statements that would be less than truthful.
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Mr. ISSA. I yield myself such time as I may consume.
Mr. Speaker, there's been a lot of talk about the documents that the Attorney General couldn't give us. These documents, documents under seal, would be an example of documents that we should not see, except in camera, and we've taken great care to ensure that no one outside Members of Congress and key staff have ever looked at them.
But I've looked at them, and what I know is that these documents, read by any person of ordinary learning, make it very clear that these wiretap applications were read and signed by individuals in the Department of Justice in Washington. And if you read them, you knew they were gunwalking. People will tell you differently. I give you my word: You read this, you know they were letting guns go to Mexico. They knew who the buyers were, who the intermediaries were, who the recipients were, and, most importantly, where they ended up. And there are reports in here, as part of the evidence given to judges in order to get wiretaps--there is evidence that they knew that, in fact, weapons had already ended up in Mexico.
That's before Brian Terry was killed. That's how Fast and Furious could have been stopped. That's how people could have been warned. In fact, that's at a time in which ATF agents in Mexico City, if they punched in the serial number of a weapon found there, they got an erroneous, an error. They did not get meaningful information because that was being blocked--not by ATF, per se, but by the Department of Justice under the auspices of the U.S. attorney and his bosses.
Now you're going to hear that this began under President Bush and Attorney General Mukasey. I'm going to tell you that's just false. What happened in previous administrations with some of the same local ATF agents was they exercised extremely bad judgment. They did things and pushed on programs that I believe were poorly conceived and poorly manned and as a result they lost track of weapons repeatedly. That happened. And it was wrong. The U.S. attorney at the time even declined prosecutions because of failed techniques.
All of these were shut down during the Bush administration. President Bush can take no credit for it. He didn't know it. As far as I know, the Attorney General didn't know. And anyone who saw the record of that should say: This was wrong-minded. But during this administration, during the time in which the Attorney General and his key lieutenants, including Lanny Breuer, were in charge, they reopened the prosecutions from a failed program called Wide Receiver and they opened Fast and Furious.
Now I'm the second child in a family. I have an older brother. I learned at a very young age you in fact cannot, when you do something wrong, say: My brother Billy did it. It doesn't work that way. You're responsible for what you do wrong, whether it happened before your watch or not. This happened on the Attorney General's watch.
But that's not why we're here today. We're here because when we asked legitimate questions about Brian Terry's murder, about Fast and Furious, we were lied to. We were lied to repeatedly and over a 10-month period. The fact is that is what we're here for. The American people want to know if you give false testimony to Congress.
The minority leader talked about, Why is there such a hurry? Why was there a 10-month delay? I was sworn in just a few days before this investigation began, and now we're nearing an election. We don't want to have this during an election. We want to have resolution for the Terry family.
The important thing is, we know enough to know that we have people who have told us under penalty of criminal prosecution--they have told Congress and their employees certain documents exist. And we've asked for those documents. And we've been denied them. We can't bring Kenneth Melson back in in good faith and say, Well, we've got to get them in front of our committee, if in fact there's documents he says exist. And they do, and they will not be given to us. We want to have those so we can ask the best questions.
You've heard earlier that in fact we've denied somehow due process to the minority. My ranking member is very capable, and has asked for minority days; in other words, hearings exclusively for him. He chose not to do it. When we were having the local ATF and other individuals in early on, all of whom worked for this government, he didn't even ask for any. It wasn't until we asked to have the Attorney General come in, based on these false statements and final retraction, that he suddenly wanted a previous Attorney General, who happened to say, No, I don't want to come. So on that particular day we would have had to subpoena him to get him in. I have no objection to having the former Attorney General in. I believe that on his watch and his predecessor's watch and his predecessor's watch and for a very long time we have not done a good job of overseeing the actions of field agents when it comes to guns.
But, again, we're here today, for the first time in over 200 years, to deal with an Attorney General who has flat-out refused to give the information related to lies and a coverup exclusively within his jurisdiction. That's what we're voting on.
I urge a ``yes'' vote on the contempt on behalf of the Terry family.
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Mr. ISSA. Mr. Speaker, I yield myself 1 minute.
I respect the gentleman from Michigan, the dean of the House, but you're just wrong. There were plenty of opportunities for the minority to ask for witnesses. They chose not to except at one hearing, and then they wanted the former Attorney General. They did not avail themselves of the procedures allowing them to have a hearing even though they know how to do it and have done it.
But more importantly, when you say you represent Brian Terry, you do not. The Terry family issued this statement, referring to Congressman Dingell:
His views don't represent those of the Terry family. Nor does he speak to the Terry family. And he has never spoken to the Terry family.
Secondly:
His office sent us a condolence letter when Brian was buried 18 months ago. That's the last time we heard from him.
Third:
A year ago, after the Oversight and Government Reform Committee began its work, one of Brian's sisters called Representative Dingell's office seeking help and answers. No one from his office called back.
Lastly:
If Rep. Dingell truly wants to support the Terry family and honor Brian Terry, a son of Michigan, he and other Members of Congress will call for the Attorney General to immediately provide the documents requested by the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.
I reserve the balance of my time.
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