By The Staff at AFP
Republican lawmakers on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee called on Attorney General Eric Holder to resign even as the country’s top lawyer dodged questions about his involvement in what many are calling a criminal scheme by the U.S. government to traffic weapons to Mexican drug gangs.
During his testimony, Holder ranted angrily about the alleged “unfairness” of him having to answer questions about why he used bogus documents to conceal the fact that weapons sold in the government gunrunning operation were used to murder U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry.
“Nobody’s been disciplined. Nobody’s been fired,” Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-Texas) told the embattled Holder. “It might be time for you to resign.”
Holder opened his remarks by acknowledging that “Fast and Furious”—the U.S. governmental operation to supply arms to Mexican narco- guerrillas, who are waging veritable war against the governments of Mexico and the United States—was a mistake. However, he claimed it was cooked up by people in his employ and was something he could not personally be held accountable for.
Evidence presented to the committee during five previous hearings shows that Holder lied to Congress about Fast and Furious, claiming it did not exist. Since then, he has changed his tune and also admitted that the Justice Department laundered money for Mexican drug gangs as well.
The Fast and Furious operation was the brainchild of Patrick Cunningham, the head of the Criminal Division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Phoenix. It was Cunningham whom Holder referenced in comments he made claiming that his subordinates deceived him and other Department of Justice supervisors as to the nature of the program.
Cunningham recently took the Fifth Amendment and refused to testify before Congress, claiming he was under criminal investigation for his actions in setting up and controlling the Fast and Furious program.
Holder himself has been threatened with a criminal contempt of Congress citation for his continuing refusal to release almost 10,000 documents relating to the program.
Recently, the family of U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who was murdered by thugs using guns provided to Mexican narco-guerrillas by Holder, has filed a civil lawsuit seeking $25 million in damages from the Obama administration
Terry was killed in late 2010 during a cross-border raid conducted by Mexican drug traffickers. An investigation into the murder found that the guns used were provided to Mexican drug cartels by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, and that the operation was conceived and carried out by the U.S. Attorney’s Office under the supervision of Holder.
