The last time Joe Biden nominated a left-wing anti-gun ideologue to head up the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), the nominee’s virulent anti-gun position sank his nomination into oblivion.
According to Politico’s inside sources, Biden’s going to try again: same ideology, different name. Politico said that, according to “multiple people” inside the White House, including “one official within the Senate Democratic Caucus,” Biden will officially nominate Steve Dettelbach. He served as U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio during the Obama administration from 2009 to 2016.
Dettelbach has the right (i.e., left) credentials: Graduating from Dartmouth College and Harvard Law School, he was nominated by then-President Obama in 2009 to his U.S. attorney position. This no doubt was a payoff for his work in Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign, for which he provided legal assistance and advice. Following Obama’s election, Dettelbach served as a legal advisor to his transition team.
He was a candidate for the office of Ohio’s attorney general in 2018 and lost, but in the process revealed where he stands on issues relating to private gun ownership: No one should own an “assault-style” rifle, and everyone buying a firearm anywhere from anybody at any time needs to undergo a background check first. That background check would then be added to the recently revealed secret registry that the ATF has been keeping, now totaling nearly one billion records.
If confirmed, Dettelbach would go along with the Biden administration’s stated determination to weaponize the ATF against private gun owners and dealers, especially gun dealers.
Given the labyrinthine minefield of current regulations under which gun dealers operate, there would be no forgiveness even for minor errors, mistakes, or infractions. Lawrence Keane, general counsel for the firearms trade association National Shooting Sports Foundation (NSSF), warned in October 2020:
The Biden-Harris ticket will weaponize the ATF against retailers to close them down for even minor clerical errors in inspections.
This is a promise Senator Kamala Harris made from the campaign stage.
She has vowed to turn the ATF from an agency which assists family-owned firearm retail businesses to stay within the overwhelming labyrinth of federal and state laws and regulations to one that carries a heavy hammer and will shutter federally licensed retailers for minor administrative errors.
When Biden’s first nominee to head the ATF, David Chipman, went down to defeat, Senator Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) tweeted: “His defeat is a win for the Constitution — and a crushing flow for Joe Biden.”
Dudley Brown, founder and president of the National Association of Gun Rights (NAGR), was pleased to learn that the White House had dropped Chipman down its memory hole:
Chipman … could not garner enough support in the U.S. Senate to make it through the confirmation process.
David Chipman’s nomination to lead the ATF was a slap in the face to gun owners across the country. Now, thanks to pro-gun grassroots, we’ve put Chipman back where he belongs: at home.
But, warned Brown:
We know … Biden will prop up another anti-gun pawn in the near future.… We [must] stand ready to oppose their unconstitutional actions.
Brown and his nearly five million members, along with Gun Owners of America, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, and other Second Amendment supporters, will once again need to push back against Biden’s second effort to weaponize the ATF with another anti-gun radical.
Biden is expected to make the official announcement during National Police Week, May 11-17.
Related article:
White House Withdraws Nomination of David Chipman to Head ATF
