[House Hearing, 115 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
FAST AND FURIOUS, SIX YEARS LATER
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HEARING
BEFORE THE
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT
AND GOVERNMENT REFORM
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED FIFTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
JUNE 7, 2017
__________
Serial No. 115-47
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
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http://oversight.house.gov
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Committee on Oversight and Government Reform
Jason Chaffetz, Utah, Chairman
John J. Duncan, Jr., Tennessee Elijah E. Cummings, Maryland,
Darrell E. Issa, California Ranking Minority Member
Jim Jordan, Ohio Carolyn B. Maloney, New York
Mark Sanford, South Carolina Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Justin Amash, Michigan Columbia
Paul A. Gosar, Arizona Wm. Lacy Clay, Missouri
Scott DesJarlais, Tennessee Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Trey Gowdy, South Carolina Jim Cooper, Tennessee
Blake Farenthold, Texas Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina Robin L. Kelly, Illinois
Thomas Massie, Kentucky Brenda L. Lawrence, Michigan
Mark Meadows, North Carolina Bonnie Watson Coleman, New Jersey
Ron DeSantis, Florida Stacey E. Plaskett, Virgin Islands
Dennis A. Ross, Florida Val Butler Demings, Florida
Mark Walker, North Carolina Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Rod Blum, Iowa Jamie Raskin, Maryland
Jody B. Hice, Georgia Peter Welch, Vermont
Steve Russell, Oklahoma Matt Cartwright, Pennsylvania
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin Mark DeSaulnier, California
Will Hurd, Texas John P. Sarbanes, Maryland
Gary J. Palmer, Alabama
James Comer, Kentucky
Paul Mitchell, Michigan
Jonathan Skladany, Staff Director
William McKenna General Counsel
Stephen Castor, Deputy General Counsel
Tristan Leavitt, Senior Counsel
Sharon Casey, Deputy Chief Clerk
David Rapal
C O N T E N T S
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Page
Hearing held on June 7, 2017..................................... 1
WITNESSES
The Hon. Charles E. Grassley, Chairman, Committee on the
Judiciary, U.S. Senate
Oral Statement............................................... 6
Written Statement............................................ 11
Josephine Terry, Mother of Late Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry
Oral Statement............................................... 25
Written Statement............................................ 27
Robert Heyer, Terry Family Spokesman, Cousin of Late Border
Patrol Agent Brian Terry
Oral Statement............................................... 31
Written Statement............................................ 36
John Dodson, Special Agent, Phoenix Field Division, Bureau of
Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosive
Oral Statement............................................... 45
Written Statement............................................ 47
APPENDIX
Letter of May 30, 2017, to Attorney General Sessions submitted by
Mr. Lynch...................................................... 74
FAST AND FURIOUS, SIX YEARS LATER
----------
Wednesday, June 7, 2017
House of Representatives,
Committee on Oversight and Government Reform,
Washington, D.C.
The committee met, pursuant to call, at 9:30 a.m., in Room
2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Jason Chaffetz
[chairman of the committee] presiding.
Present: Representatives Chaffetz, Issa, Jordan, Amash,
Gosar, Gowdy, Massie, Meadows, DeSantis, Ross, Walker, Blum,
Hice, Russell, Grothman, Hurd, Palmer, Mitchell, Maloney,
Norton, Lynch, Cooper, Connolly, Kelly, Plaskett,
Krishnamoorthi, Raskin, Welch, and DeSaulnier.
Chairman Chaffetz. The Committee on Oversight and
Government Reform will come to order. And without objection,
the chair is authorized to declare a recess at any time.
We thank you all for being here. It is an important hearing
on a topic that has gone on for far too long. We had the death
of one of our bravest, one of our best in Brian Terry, and this
government, as I have said many, many times before, is
different than most other governments in the world and that is
we are self-critical. We do look hard at things that have
happened and that have gone wrong to make sure that the truth
is exposed and that we don't ever make these mistakes and
errors again.
We are also, as a committee and staff, issuing a--I think
it's a 259-page report. I want to thank a few people as we get
into this. I want to thank John Skladany, Steve Castor. Steve
has spent an exceptional amount of time on this, as well as
Tristan Leavitt, who is sitting here to my left, Cordell Hull,
Jack Thorlin, Natalie Turner, Mike Howell, and Rebecca Edgar, a
lot of people on our staff that spend countless hours working
on these topics, and we thank them for their preparation of
this report that we are issuing today.
We are here to check in on one of the longest-running
congressional oversight and investigative matters of our time,
an operation called Operation Fast and Furious. Congress is now
in its seventh year in search of a complete accounting of the
facts relating to the reckless gun trafficking operation that
left border patrol agent Brian Terry murdered. This happened on
December 14, 2010, and we still don't have all the answers. At
the scene of Agent Terry's murder in 2010, two modified AK-47-
type assault rifles were recovered. The weapons were traced to
Operation Fast and Furious.
The strategy of this failed operation, encouraged by the
Department of Justice, was to focus the resources of the Bureau
of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms on Mexican drug cartels rather
than low-level straw gun purchasers. As such, a program was
born that allowed straw purchasers to supply Mexican drug
cartels with firearms. Purchasing a firearm for someone other
than yourself is illegal. The shocking end-game of this
misguided plan was to identify cartel members after guns
recovered at crime scenes traced back to their original place
of purchase.
Absent from this strategy was any modicum of public safety.
ATF failed in its mission to protect our communities from
violent criminals and the illegal use and trafficking of
firearms. Let's keep in mind, these were nearly 2,000 weapons
that they knowingly and willingly let out onto the streets.
Agent Terry's family, who is here and will participate in
the second panel, should not have to wait more than six years
for answers and accountability. We are grateful they are here,
and we look forward to hearing their story again in the second
panel.
Our committee began its work in February of 2011 under the
leadership of Chairman Darrell Issa after partnering with
Senator Grassley to evaluate unfathomable whistleblower
accounts and documents coming out of ATF in Phoenix, Arizona.
Both Chairman Grassley and Chairman Issa helped lead the
charge, and we're very grateful for their efforts and look
forward to hearing more from both today.
Several Phoenix-based ATF special agents expressed
skepticism and disbelief about the program as it went against
everything they were trained to do and violated their law
enforcement oath to protect the public. Special Agent John
Dodson, who is with us today, was one of those agents. Without
Agent Dodson's determination to do the right thing, surely many
more thousands of firearms would have walked, leading to
additional deaths. He should be thanked by the Department of
Justice, the ATF, and by all of us.
But as Agent Dodson will tell us today a different story,
however, happened. His employer was not treating him as a hero.
As the committee with responsibility for oversight of Federal
whistleblower policy, we must continue to shine the light on
John Dodson's story.
The congressional investigation also led to a well-
chronicled impasse between two equal branches of government. In
June 2012, the House of Representatives held former Attorney
General Eric Holder in contempt for failing to turn over
documents relating to the investigation. The House successfully
compelled the production of many of these documents in Federal
court. In two separate judicial victories, the committee
received approximately 80,000 pages of new documents from the
Department of Justice. And again, the Department of Justice
didn't want Congress to see them and certainly didn't want the
public to see them.
However, it should not take years and endless, expensive
litigation for the executive branch to cooperate with proper
congressional oversight. We still require additional documents,
and litigation is ongoing as the Department of Justice
continues its unprecedented stonewalling of Congress and the
Terry family. And I am sorry to report, under the Trump
administration, this has not changed. This has not changed.
In previous testimony before Congress, former Attorney
General Holder committed to getting the Terry Family the
answers and explanations they needed. But when the television
lights went off, that did not happen. In fact, the opposite
happened. The Obama administration Justice Department went so
far as to litigate against the Terry family. The Justice
Department wrote briefs and argued in Federal court against the
family's efforts to intervene as a crime victim in the Fast and
Furious prosecutions. It is a travesty of justice.
We look forward to hearing from Senator Grassley, Special
Agent Dodson, and members of Brian Terry's family, including
his mother and his cousin Robert Heyer. We look forward to
hearing their accounts and perspectives from a vantage point of
six years later.
Mr. Chaffetz. But right now, we are pleased to have serving
as the ranking member today Mr. Lynch, the gentleman from
Massachusetts, and will yield as much time as he needs.
Mr. Lynch, you are now recognized.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And, Senator Grassley, you honor us by your presence here
this morning. I would like to begin by acknowledging the life
and courageous service of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, who
served as a United States Marine, a police officer in his home
State of Michigan, and an agent of U.S. Customs and Border
Protection. His life was tragically cut short when he was
murdered in a gunfight near the Mexican border in 2010. Agent
Terry's family is here today. Mrs. Terry and Mr. Heyer, we are
deeply sorry for your loss.
Ranking Member Cummings very much wanted to be here today,
but as many of you know, he is recuperating from heart surgery.
But he wanted me to extend his apologies for not being her
personally today. He was able to speak with Agent Terry's
family last month, and he offered to see if there was anything
more we could here on this committee to obtain additional
information about what happened nearly seven years ago.
As part of that effort, Ranking Member Cummings wrote a
letter to Attorney General Jeff Sessions on May 30 asking
whether the Department of Justice still had the same policy
about producing documents to Congress that it had had under the
Obama administration. Years ago, as the chairman has laid out,
this committee had a high-profile disagreement with the Justice
Department. Although it produced a great deal of information to
the committee, it withheld certain information based on the
argument that the Federal agencies have a so-called
deliberative process privilege. That issue was indeed
litigated, and the court found that agencies do in fact have
this privilege but that there were some additional documents
that were outside of the privilege that should be produced even
when applying that principle.
Following the court's order, the Department provided the
committee with access to thousands of pages of additional
documents last summer. In his letter to Attorney General
Sessions, Ranking Member Cummings again asked whether the
Department policy on these documents is the same as it was
under the Obama administration. He asked whether Attorney
General Sessions is now asserting the same privilege that
Attorney General Holder and the Obama administration did,
whether Attorney General Sessions has changed these policies to
provide additional documents to the committee.
Ranking Member Cummings shared his letter with Agent
Terry's family members, and, Mr. Chairman, I ask unanimous
consent that we place this May 30 letter from Mr. Cummings to
Attorney General Sessions into the official record for today's
hearing.
Chairman Chaffetz. Without objection, so ordered.
Mr. Lynch. Unfortunately, the Department responded on
Monday that it will not provide us with answers to the ranking
member's questions, it will not explain whether the Attorney
General is changing the Department's policies or legal
interpretations, and it declined to send anyone here today to
testify about these questions. Instead, the Department informed
us that it is continuing to discuss these matters with the
chairman. Because Democrats have not been invited to
participate in those discussions, we have no idea whether
Attorney General will let us have any of these remaining
documents at this point.
This also raises a second problem. Last week, the White
House directed a new policy that Federal agencies should ignore
requests for information from Members of the committee other
than Republican committee chairmen. This new policy relies on
an opinion from the Department of Justice Office of Legal
Counsel, which claims that the authority to conduct oversight,
quote, ``may be exercised only by each House of Congress or
under existing delegations by committee and subcommittees or
their chairman and that individual Members of Congress do not
have the authority to conduct oversight in the absence of a
special delegation by a full House committee or subcommittee.''
That analysis is indeed wrong, it flies in the face of
Supreme Court precedent, and it is a mistake. The great irony
here is that we have the Honorable Senator Grassley testifying
before us today, and he was responsible, I believe, for first
bringing Operation Fast and Furious to light in 2011. And at
the time, Senator Grassley was not a committee chairman. He was
in the minority. But we congratulated him on his diligence and
hard work.
The Trump administration should acknowledge and respect the
constitutional oversight role of every Member of Congress,
regardless of party, because we do our oversight in service of
the American people, not on behalf of political parties like
the Terry family.
As Senator Grassley wrote in a letter back in 2009 about
the role of the minority, quote, ``As a senior Member of the
United States Senate and the ranking member of the Finance
Committee, I have a duty under the Constitution to conduct
oversight into the actions of executive branch agencies.''
Senator Grassley was right.
Finally, I want to address an issue that was raised by the
Terry family when Americans are killed in the line of duty, as
Agent Terry was. Their family members deserve our support. And
today, I'm asking that the Department of Justice review its
policies and procedures for supporting the families of those
who lose their lives in service to our country. I hope the
chairman and other members of the committee will join me in
that request, and by working to ensure that the victims'
families are supported, we can honor Agent Terry's legacy.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I yield back the balance of
our time.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank the gentleman. I would simply
note that I actually concur with your notion that the--if the
Department of Justice is taking a position that they should not
respond but only respond to chairmen, I think that is a
dangerous and unsustainable policy. And so I just want you to
know that I concur with you.
I want members to know we will hold the record open for
five legislative days for any members who would like to submit
a written statement.
We would now like to recognize our distinguished witness on
the first panel, the chairman of the Senate Judiciary
Committee. But in order to properly introduce him, I would like
to recognize a colleague, the gentleman from Iowa, Mr. Blum, as
well as Mr. Issa after that.
Mr. Blum, you are now recognized.
Mr. Blum. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
It is my pleasure today to introduce my friend and fellow
Iowan, Senator Charles Grassley. The chairman of the Senate
Judiciary Committee, Senator Grassley recently began serving
his seventh term in the United States Senate. The former
chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Grassley also
served in the Iowa House and the U.S. House before coming to
the Senate.
Senator Grassley has been an important partner to this
committee in Fast and Furious investigation, and we are
privileged to have him join us today.
As co-chairman of the Senate Whistleblower Protection
Caucus, he is a tireless advocate for whistleblowers, including
Special Agent John Dodson. This investigation has shown the
important role whistleblowers play in enabling Congress to
conduct oversight of the executive branch.
After unsuccessfully raising his concerns within the
Department of Justice, Special Agent Dodson contacted Senator
Grassley's office in 2011. In January of that year, Senator
Grassley wrote a letter to the ATF regarding the allegations
and later partnered with this committee to better understand
the Fast and Furious operation and to determine if there was
any wrongdoing, abuse of authority, or failed supervision.
During that investigation, the Justice Department falsely
denied that law enforcement officers had allowed straw
purchasers to buy firearms illegally and trafficking them
without being apprehended, directly contradicting the claims of
whistleblowers. The Department of Justice was later forced to
withdraw their denial.
Armed with information provided by whistleblowers, Senator
Grassley and this committee have continued to press Department
of Justice for documents related to Fast and Furious, resorting
to the court system when necessary.
Senator, I thank you for being with us today. We appreciate
your hard work on this matter and are looking forward to your
testimony today. Thank you for being here. And I yield back.
Chairman Chaffetz. Thank you. I will now recognize Mr.
Issa.
Mr. Issa. Thank you. And thank you, Mr. Chairman, for this
special honor. I will be brief.
Chuck, thank you. You know, many on this dais here were not
in Congress when you began your effort six-plus years ago, and
apparently, many don't understand that you were in the minority
and they were seeking not to, in fact, cooperate. And it was
through a partnership with your staff, which were excellent and
added so much to this committee, with your use of--although
minority--your voting capability, my ability to write
subpoenas, and then the leadership's willingness to go all the
way to contempt that we are here today with what we know,
knowing that we don't know everything.
So I join with the chairman and today's ranking member in
saying, yes, I believe the minority should be heard and should
be reasonably answered. I would say, though, that our great
partnership, one that I will cherish, started with their
assumption that they would give you a lie as a letter and then
for 10 dogged months stick by that lie. And only with your
tenacity were we able to get beyond that. So I am just happy to
be able to thank you today, Senator.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank the gentleman.
Again, Senator Grassley, we are honored to have you here as
the chairman of the Judiciary Committee. The time is now yours,
sir.
WITNESS STATEMENTS
STATEMENT OF HON. CHUCK GRASSLEY
Senator Grassley. Those are very kind introductions. Thank
you very much. And before I read, I would like to thank
Chairman Chaffetz and Ranking Member Lynch not only for the
opportunity to appear here but also I listened to your remarks
about two things, whistleblowing and oversight, and they are
kind of connected.
And I want Mr. Lynch to know that I still stand by my 2009
letter, and I am glad that everybody else so far that has
spoken on this committee realizes that sometimes you are in the
majority and sometimes you are in the minority. There is a
process that has to be available. So I am going to be
responding in a letter to the White House in a day or two to
those recommendations they put out that I disagree with them
and why I disagree with them.
And I think a new phrase in this town is very appropriate
for what this issue is all about because the word ``drain the
swamp'' doesn't necessarily mean fire people or get rid of
organizations. It means change the culture in this town. And
one of the cultures is, whether you have Republican or Democrat
Presidents, the bureaucracy is sometimes embarrassed by what
they do, and we want to expose it and we want to expose it
because transparency brings accountability, and accountability
is very important if you work for the American taxpayers.
The second thing I would say deals with the word
whistleblower. Mr. Dodson is one example of how whistleblowers
are treated both in Republican and Democrat administrations.
And I suggest to this President, as I suggested to other
Presidents, that what we need is once a year a Rose Garden
ceremony honoring some whistleblowers so that the bureaucracy,
which is permanent, and Presidents and Members of Congress are
not permanent, that from the top of the bureaucracy, in other
words, the Chief Executive all the way down to whatever you
want to consider the job in the lower end of the bureaucracy,
that whistleblowing is a political, patriotic thing and the
right thing to do and that they ought to be honored. And
normally, how are they treated by our bureaucracy not just in
ATF, not just in the Justice Department but almost throughout
the bureaucracy, they are treated like a skunk at a picnic and
that is wrong. And government is less off for it when we have
that attitude.
I would like to proceed, so I hope you haven't started the
clock yet.
[Laughter.]
Chairman Chaffetz. The way of the Senate, absolutely.
Senator Grassley. Okay. Thank you for inviting me to
testify about an important congressional investigation that the
Justice Department has stonewalled for far too long: Operation
Fast and Furious. This investigation began six years ago. The
fact that it is still tied up in the courts is proof positive
that our system of checks and balances is broken. Congress
needs to reform its process for enforcing compliance with
subpoenas.
It all started when courageous agents blew the whistle on
gunwalking to the Senate Judiciary Committee. We learned that
the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives
sanctioned the illegal sale of hundreds of assault weapons to
straw purchasers, who then trafficked the guns to Mexican
cartels. These weapons have since been discovered in the hands
of criminals both within the United States and Mexico. Two of
these weapons were used in the firefight that led to the tragic
death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry in December of 2010.
After it became clear that the government planned to cover it
up, agents, patriotic agents blew the whistle.
On January 27, 2011, I wrote to ATF for answers. But the
Department of Justice and ATF had no intention of looking for
honest answers and being transparent. In fact, from the very
onset, bureaucrats employed shameless delay tactics to obstruct
the investigation. In a letter to me February 4, 2011,
Department officials denied that ATF had ever walked guns. But
the evidence kept mounting that the official denial was just
plain false.
Through documents obtained during this long litigation, we
have learned how the bureaucrats and even political appointees
reacted when they learned the truth. As the Department became
aware that the information it provided to Congress was wrong,
it kept the truth hidden. DOJ refused to come clean, refused to
notify Congress, and refused to correct the record.
As soon as March 2011, officials at ATF and within the
Department raised concerns about the inaccuracy of the
information provided to me in that February 4 letter. But the
Department still failed to withdraw the letter until nine
months later, in December, thus admitting they lied to a U.S.
Senator or to the United States Senate.
Why did it take so long then to admit the truth to
Congress? Our two committees requested documents from the
Department that would shed light on the delay. October 2011,
this House committee issued a subpoena for documents from the
Department of Justice, including documents related to the
Department's response to Congress.
The Department initially refused to produce any documents
responsive to the subpoena. It refused to assert any privilege
at that time or provide a log of withheld documents so that
this committee could consider whether there were any
legitimate, legitimate reasons for not providing those
documents. Instead, the Department merely made vague, feeble
claims that the documents implicated words we are acquainted
with ``confidentiality interests'' or another words that they
used as an excuse, ``separation of power'' concerns.
Then, the ridiculous happened. In June 2012, the Justice
Department had to ask President Obama to give it some cover by
formally asserting executive privilege. The request came on the
eve of a vote in this committee to hold the Attorney General in
contempt. And the President's assertion was communicated to
this committee only minutes before the scheduled vote. The
committee rejected the President's claim on the merits, and so
did the full House in a historic bipartisan vote because it =
was the first time an Attorney General was held in contempt of
Congress. But to add to the obstruction, the Obama
administration refused to present the contempt citation to a
grand jury, as required by statute.
Then, in August 2012, this committee filed a civil lawsuit
to try and enforce its subpoena that way. Once in the courts,
even more lengthy delays then began. Two years later, in August
2014, the court finally ordered the Department to review all
the documents, provide a log explaining why it wanted to
withhold specific items, and to produce everything that the
Department itself admitted was not covered by any privilege.
The Department then produced more than 10,000 of the
originally withheld documents. These documents totaled about
64,000 pages. To be clear--and this is very important--the
Department tried to hide these documents from Congress by
getting President Obama to assert executive privilege, but once
the case was before a judge, the President then totally
abandoned that claim. In effect, the government admitted that
this privilege did not apply to those documents.
Why did it take a contempt citation from Congress to force
the executive branch to finally admit that it hid documents
from the people's Representatives for completely bogus reasons?
Attorney General Holder preferred to be held in contempt rather
than admit the authority of this committee to compel production
of the documents through a subpoena, even documents that the
Justice Department and the President did not believe were
privileged. If that doesn't illustrate how broken our system of
congressional subpoena enforcement is, then I don't know what
does.
The capitulation of the Department, once a judge finally
forced its hand, proves that the initial claims of privilege
were deceptive and unfounded. It was nothing more than an
attempt to obstruct Congress' constitutional responsibility of
oversight and this investigation. The Department's belated
admission that those 64,000 pages were not privileged puts the
gold seal of authenticity on the House's bipartisan vote to
hold the Attorney General in contempt. The documents exposed
the Justice Department's intent to hide information from
Congress and upsets the balance of powers.
Obstructing a valid inquiry by a separate, co-equal branch
of government undermines our constitutional system of checks
and balances. The documents show a highly politicized climate
at the Obama administration's main justice, focused more on
spin and coverup than on transparency and fact-finding.
Now, despite the court's orders to the Department to
produce documents that were admittedly not privileged, the
Judge's opinion as a whole is problematic, and we have to take
a good look at that. Although the judge also later ordered the
production of more material, the judge's reasoning is fatally
flawed. The judge erroneously concluded that certain of the
Department's underlying privilege claims, although waived, were
valid. The judge gave the House a victory in practice but gave
the Department a victory on principle.
By splitting the baby in this way, the opinion seeks for
the first time to push the scope of executive privilege outside
the White House to cloak low-level government bureaucrats in
secrecy. This is new and unprecedented territory. It is a major
threat to the oversight powers of the legislative branch. The
President should not be able to shield information in all the
vast agencies and departments of government from congressional
scrutiny. If it has nothing to do with advice to the President
by his advisors, then why should it be privileged?
That is why the House must push forward with its appeal to
get the District Court's opinion overturned. The so-called
deliberative process privilege is no constitutional privilege
at all. It is common-law doctrine and a statutory exception
under the Freedom of Information Act only. It only applies to
discussions about the formulation of policy and only before a
final policy decision has been made.
The privilege should not extend to allow the Department to
hide its internal communications about responding to Congress.
These communications were not to or from the President, and now
we know that they largely focused on obstructing Congress and
strategizing to avoid negative press coverage. Those
communications can hardly be characterized as forming
Department of Justice policy, as the judge wants us to think,
and should not even be protected by the deliberative process
statutory exemption, let alone some new form of executive
privilege.
Now, this litigation has been ongoing for a long time. The
American people, including the Terry family, they are right
here, they are right here to remind us of what government can
do that is illegal and get away with it. They remind us of what
can be done when whistleblowers that are patriotically
conscious come forward.
So let me start again. The American people, including the
Terry family here with us today, deserve a complete accounting
for questions posed in this investigation that began with
people coming to me in 2011. It has been, as we have repeated
so many times, six long years. We are still waiting. But this
is not just about documents in Fast and Furious. This case also
must be considered from the perspective of the institutional
role of Congress of oversight.
So I urge you all to take off your partisan hats for a
moment. Imagine if the shoe were on the other foot. This case
has broad implications for the ability of elected
representatives of the American people to do our constitutional
duty to act as a check on the executive branch of government.
Clearly, Congress needs to do something. It cannot take
years for this body to get answers from a co-equal branch of
government about information that has no legal basis to stay
hidden from the representatives of the American people and a
proper check to make sure that the executive branch does its
job of duly enforcing the law.
That is why I am working with my colleagues on proposals to
modernize the rules of engagement in congressional oversight.
We need a package of rules and legislative changes so that
responders to congressional inquiries cannot rely on phony
privilege claims and delay tactics. These changes will make it
easier for Members of Congress to get the information they need
to do their job for the American people that pay them and who
they represent. So I look forward to continuing to work with my
colleagues in both the Senate and the House on these proposals
and hope you will all join me.
I thank you for allowing me to appear, but more
importantly, we would not be where we are today because in 2011
I was not a chairman of a committee, and those excuses were
used against me as this administration is using those excuses
once again. So this committee was in the majority and we had a
chairman and committee members that were willing to pursue
this, and thank God you were in the majority at that time or we
still may not have any information.
Thank you very much.
[Prepared statement of Senator Grassley follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Chaffetz. Chairman Grassley, thank you. We
appreciate your time. We know you have an obligation in the
Senate at 10:00, and by mutual agreement and concurrence with
the minority, the committee is now going to go into recess. The
committee's in recess.
Senator Grassley. Thank you.
[Recess.]
Chairman Chaffetz. The committee will come to order. We are
now here to recognize the second panel of witnesses. We are
very pleased to welcome Ms. Josephine Terry. She is the mother
of the late Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry. And, Ms. Terry, on
behalf of all of us, both sides of the aisle, we thank you for
your son's service, and God bless you. Thank you for being here
and talking about a very difficult subject and appreciate your
bravery and you being here today. I am sure this is not
something in your life that you ever thought or chose to do,
but we are honored and privileged to hear from you and want to
hear your full story.
We also have Mr. Robert Heyer. He is the Terry family
spokesman. He is also the cousin of late Border Patrol Agent
Brian Terry. And, Mr. Heyer, we again are saddened for the loss
in the Terry family but appreciate your willingness and ability
to come here and share a perspective from the family, which we
should never, ever forget. And we thank you for being here.
We also have Mr. John Dodson, who is a special agent,
Phoenix Field Division, Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms,
and Explosives. And if you listen to this gentleman's story and
what he has gone through, somebody who is serving this country
as patriotically as he possibly can, it is absolutely horrific.
And, sir, we thank you for your service and everything that you
have gone through. We appreciate your candidness, answering
questions to the committee throughout the process. But we look
forward to your public testimony, and again, thank you for your
commitment to the United States of America and your willingness
to come here and share your story with us as well.
Pursuant to committee rules, all witnesses are to be sworn
before they testify. So, if you will please, now that you have
settled in, go ahead and stand back up and raise your right
hand.
[Witnesses sworn.]
Chairman Chaffetz. Thank you. Let the record reflect that
all witnesses answered in the affirmative.
In order to allow time for discussion, we would appreciate
it if you would limit your verbal comments to five minutes. We
will give you a little bit of leeway, but if you could limit
that. Your entire written statement, as you have submitted, as
the committee members already have, will be entered into the
record.
You are going to need to pull those microphones nice,
tight, and close to your mouth, and then you just make sure you
hit that ``talk'' button. There are lights there that will
indicate, as Mr. Gowdy likes to say, green is go, yellow means
speed up, and red means, okay, you have actually got to stop.
So, pay attention to that if you could.
But, Mrs. Terry, you are now recognized for five minutes.
Push that talk button if you could. It should illuminate. Thank
you. There you go.
STATEMENT OF JOSEPHINE TERRY
Ms. Terry. Mr. Chairman and members of the committee, good
morning. My name is Josephine Terry, and I am the mother of
Brian Terry.
My son was first a marine, a local police officer, and
finally a Border Patrol agent. He loved his country and
everything about it. He dedicated his entire adult life to the
protection of the American people. Brian believed in truth and
justice.
Just over six years ago, Brian was on patrol in the Arizona
desert. In the darkness, he was shot and killed by a cartel
drug trafficker.
I picked out my son's casket through weeping and tears. At
his burial, Brian's coffin was covered with an American flag.
My only goal was to make sure he was laid to rest with honors.
That honor has been insulted by coverups and deception by the
very people he served.
I refuse to also let our flag cover up the fact of how and
why Brian died or allow it to hide from those who are
responsible. I need you to help me. I need you to help me now.
ATF, the Department of Justice, and possibly people even
higher up in the government knowingly intended to provide
thousands of guns to the Mexican cartel. They gave their plan a
glorious name, which was Fast and Furious. From the moment a
bullet was fired from one of those Fast and Furious guns, from
the moment that bullet entered Brian's body and ended his life,
Brian's government, my government, your government, began to
hide the truth.
One of ATF's Fast and Furious leaders dismissed Brian's
death by saying, ``You have to scramble a few eggs to make an
omelet.'' That man has since been promoted by ATF and given
awards by the Justice Department. Did you know that?
ATF and DOJ made sure that all those involved were given
new jobs or allowed to retire with their government pensions
and benefits. No one was punished or prosecuted. When I pay my
taxes and when you pay yours, we are funding the comforts of
those who helped murder my son.
We know that Brian encountered bad people that night he was
killed. We know there was a gun battle. We know Brian was shot
and killed. We know the gun used to kill him was fired by a
drug trafficker. We know the gun was put in the murderer's
hands by our government, and there is so much more that we
don't know.
I need you to have President Obama's executive privilege
order that hides many of the facts from Fast and Furious
overturned. I need you to ask President Trump to keep the
promise he made to my family on his campaign trail to let you
see those documents.
Only one possible motivation remains for all of those
involved who have covered up Fast and Furious. That is to
conceal their own shame and disgrace, quite possibly their
crimes.
I need you to find out why Fast and Furious was even
allowed to happen. I also need you to find out why those
involved were all given soft landings for their lives and their
careers, and not just the lower-level people but just the--and
just the scapegoats. But how high did the knowledge and
approval go? Our country deserves the truth, regardless of how
embarrassing it may be.
Brian believed in the truth and justice, and he died for
it. What he would never would have accepted, and what I cannot
accept now on his behalf, is the cover up of the truth and the
avoidance of justice.
As the chairman and members of the Oversight Committee, I
sit before you and plead with you to fulfill the jobs that you
have been elected to. I am giving you my faith that, as a
public servant, you believe in truth and justice as much as
Brian did.
I have a picture of my son.
He died for us. He died for all of us. He bled to death in
the darkness of the Arizona desert, mostly alone, to protect
this country. Please protect Brian now. Put your party policies
aside. Fulfill your obligations to the American people.
Represent all the people who voted for you into office and
demand answers and full accountability.
And on behalf of my family and myself and my son, I ask you
to please see this through to a truthful and just conclusion.
Thank you.
[Prepared statement of Ms. Terry follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Chaffetz. Thank you. I appreciate that.
Mr. Heyer, you are now recognized for five minutes.
STATEMENT OF ROBERT HEYER
Mr. Heyer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Before I begin my
comments, I just wanted to ask your indulgence as I describe
the many indignities that the Terry family suffered over the
last six years. No American family deserves to be treated like
they have by their government.
I see a lot of familiar faces here--well, not a lot but
several familiar faces, and I want to thank those members that
were here six-and-a-half years ago and six years ago almost to
the day. Thank you for your leadership. Chairman Issa,
Congressman Gowdy, and the other members of the Oversight
Committee that originally fought for truth and the answers that
the Terry family deserve.
I think it's fair to say that Americans maintain a strong
disdain for dirty little secrets, especially when those secrets
are being kept by government officials looking to hide poor
judgment and misconduct. The death of Brian Terry in 2010
served as the catalyst that exposed a pattern of poor judgment
and misconduct by several top officials in the Department of
Justice, the U.S. Attorney's Office, and the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco, and Firearms.
Despite Brian Terry's death, the full extent of the fatally
flawed gun trafficking investigation known as Operation Fast
and Furious was not immediately made known to the American
public because government officials were keeping a dirty little
secret.
Good morning Chairman Chaffetz, Chairman Issa, Ranking
Member Lynch, Senator Grassley, and other honorable members of
this committee. My name is Robert Heyer. I'm the cousin of
slain U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and chairman of the
Brian Terry Foundation. It's been almost six years since I
first appeared before this committee. When I was here last, the
impact of Brian Terry's death was still fresh and the
revelation that our government had provided the very weapons to
the men that killed Brian was almost too shocking to believe.
Over time, I have developed a better understanding of Operation
Fast and Furious and the questionable behavior of the
government officials involved in that secret investigation.
My comments to this committee six years ago were tempered
because of my strong belief that once the facts of this case
were known, our President and our Attorney General would move
quickly and decisively to fully investigate the investigation.
Back then, I was confident that our leaders would ultimately
find and hold those government officials responsible for the
many failures of that poorly thought-out gun trafficking
investigation. Even the members of this committee promised to
fully investigate and seek justice in the matter.
Over time, I saw Department of Justice brimming with
incompetence and arrogance. I witnessed government officials
less interested in the truth and the facts behind the ill-
conceived investigation and more interested in moving to
contain the public relations disaster of a U.S. Border Patrol
agent being murdered by drug cartel members carrying weapons
supplied to them by ATF.
Agents in ATF who were privy to this information were
expected to be good soldiers and keep their mouths shut.
Inconceivably, no one in our government spoke openly about the
connection between Operation Fast and Furious and Brian Terry's
murder. Brian Terry's murder was the absolute worst-case
scenario for those involved in orchestrating this gun
trafficking investigation. Just as some ATF agents had warned,
a U.S. law enforcement officer had been murdered with weapons
allowed to ``walk'' during that investigation.
The immediate reaction by officials at ATF, the U.S.
Attorney's office, and DOJ was to limit the release of
information and to ultimately deny the fact that weapons were
ever ``walked'' to straw buyers working for the Mexican drug
cartels. The fact that two assault weapons found at the murder
scene were purchased a year earlier by one of the primary
suspects in the investigation was deemed extremely sensitive
and only discussed among top officials in these organizations.
The Terry family and I believe that government officials
responsible for Fast and Furious were not only trying to
contain the political damage but were also trying to attempt to
cover up the link between that information and Brian Terry's
murder. There was a little dirty secret that was being kept
from the American public.
Over the last six years, we've witnessed a number of
examples of clear incompetence and arrogance exhibited by those
in ATF, the U.S. Attorney's Office, and DOJ as they attempted
to contain the public relations disaster and distance
themselves from the Fast and Furious investigation. A lack of
transparency was noted in my many dealings with government
officials over this time, and I began to understand why these
officials were keeping the facts of the case from the Terrys.
I remember at Brian Terry's funeral, then-DHS Secretary
Janet Napolitano and Commissioner Alan Bersin traveled to
Detroit to meet with the Terry family. Despite being the senior
officials present, neither Secretary Napolitano or Commissioner
Bersin chose to inform the family that the two assault weapons
found at the scene were linked to the gun trafficking
investigation. It should be noted that these two senior
officials had just come back from Tucson, Arizona, where they
had been extensively briefed on Brian Terry's murder by the
head of the FBI in Tucson and the U.S. Attorney's office.
In January 2011, the Terrys attended the public memorial
ceremony held in Arizona. Again, Commissioner Bersin attended,
along with U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke to meet with the family.
Once again, neither official chose to share the information
that the men that killed Brian Terry carried weapons provided
them--to them by ATF.
It wasn't until February that the family began to learn the
truth. The facts were not provided by government officials but
rather by a lone whistleblower who was alarmed at the lack of
transparency surrounding Brian Terry's death. With the
exception of this lone ATF agent, no one in government was
willing to talk publicly about the dirty little secret known as
Operation Fast and Furious and its connection to Brian Terry's
murder.
In February of 2011, the family of Brian Terry learned for
the first time through a television journalist that the weapons
found at the murder scene were, in fact, connected to Fast and
Furious. No one in the Federal Government had ever spoken to
the Terry family about this connection. Despite the claims of
ATF Special Agent John Dodson, officials in ATF and DOJ
continued to deny that guns had been sold to individuals known
as straw buyers and that those weapons eventually ended up in
the hands of the Mexican drug cartels.
It was then, only after the news media began to publish
Agent Dodson's claims that U.S. Attorney in Arizona, Dennis
Burke, offered to provide information to the Terry Family. And
in March of 2011, Burke traveled to the Terry home in Michigan.
When asked about the origin of the weapons found at the murder
scene, Mr. Burke denied that they were part of Operation Fast
and Furious. Instead, he told family members the weapons were
found at the murder scene originated from a gun store in Texas.
We now know that this was untrue.
We know now through emails obtained by this committee that
Mr. Burke without a doubt on the evening of Brian Terry's
murder knew that the two AK-47-style assault weapons found at
the murder scene were from Operation Fast and Furious. We know
now that on the same day of Brian Terry's death, DOJ and ATF
personnel were scrambling to find and arrest Jaime Avila, Jr.,
the well-known straw buyer of these exact weapons. Despite
these facts, no one in government wanted to talk about their
dirty little secret with the Terry family or the American
public.
In April of 2011, I traveled to Phoenix and received a
briefing from the U.S. Attorney's Office on the status of the
murder investigation. I was told that the FBI had conducted
ballistic tests on the two weapons found at the murder scene
and the bullet recovered from Brian Terry's body. I was told
that the FBI had determined without a doubt that neither weapon
recovered from the murder scene had fired the fatal bullet.
I later obtained that FBI ballistics report from sources
outside of the DOJ. What that report really says is that the
test results were inconclusive due to deformities of the bullet
recovered from Brian's body. I have always wondered why the
U.S. Attorney in Arizona and his staff were not more precise in
their description of that FBI ballistics report.
Senator Grassley already spoke about the letter sent by DOJ
on February 4, 2011, and even today, I find it professional
incomprehensible that the DOJ officials failed to simply speak
with ATF Agent John Dodson and interview him about Operation
Fast and Furious. Had these officials chosen to speak with
Agent Dodson, they would have learned the truth about
gunwalking immediately.
It was about this time that Assistant Attorney General
Lanny Breuer arrogantly stated that if Brian Terry had not been
killed with an Operation Fast and Furious gun, he would have
been killed by some other gun. I was sickened by Mr. Breuer's
comments not only because they were incredibly callous, but
also because Mr. Breuer's comments reflected an unprecedented
level of arrogance within the Department of Justice at the
time.
We know now that Mr. Breuer himself received briefings on
Operation Fast and Furious and failed to exercise the good
judgment and common sense to foresee the public safety
ramifications of letting 2,000 military style weapons ``walk''
to the Mexican drug cartels. Mr. Breuer's callous comments also
failed to take into account that Brian Terry and his BORTAC
team would have used different tactics when trying to apprehend
a drug cartel rip crew if they had only known that ATF and the
Department of Justice had armed these individuals with state-
of-the-art military weapons.
If only Mr. Breuer, the DOJ attorneys, and the ATF bosses
in Phoenix Field Division had not kept this dirty little secret
from the U.S. Border Patrol. I believe that if Brian Terry and
his team had known this information, chances are Brian would be
alive today. Unfortunately, Brian Terry and his team had no
idea that the rip crew they encountered would be emboldened by
the weapons that they carried and were ready to use those
weapons against U.S. law enforcement.
The most disappointing and demoralizing act of all for the
Terry family was in June of 2011 when President Obama asserted
executive privilege over documents being sought by
congressional investigators. The President's order effectively
ended the hope of the Terry family to fully understand why the
Department of Justice denied gun walking in the first place. My
personal disappointment in the President on this decision to
invoke executive privilege in this matter continues to this
day.
In September 2012, we read the long-awaited report on
Operation Fast and Furious from the inspector general. The
report identified several Department of Justice employees who
bore particular responsibility for the many mistakes made in
Operation Fast and Furious. It should be noted that these
individuals have continued in their employment with the
government despite the findings of the IG's report and the
death of Brian Terry.
Additionally, ATF's own Professional Review Board had
recommended termination for at least one of these individuals;
yet, ATF leadership failed to act on this recommendation.
Instead, these employees were instructed to keep their mouths
shut, and in return, they would be provided with private
defense attorneys whose exorbitant fees would be paid by the
American taxpayers.
In 2014, I spoke with the lead special agent investigating
the murder of Brian Terry. The agent told me that she had not
been initially informed by ATF agents or the U.S. Attorney's
Office personnel that the weapons recovered from the scene of
the murder had been traced to Operation Fast and Furious.
Imagine my shock in learning that members of ATF's Phoenix
Field Division and the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona kept
this important piece of information from the lead investigator
in a Federal agent's murder. That FBI agent went on to say that
she learned of this connection only when the news media began
to report the link almost two months after Brian Terry's
murder. Incredibly, not even this lead FBI agent was allowed to
know the dirty little secret.
Did members of ATF's Phoenix Field Division and the U.S.
Attorney's Office in Arizona attempt to keep the details of
Fast and Furious and its connection to Brian Terry's murder
from becoming public knowledge? We now know through review of
official emails that ATF officials in Phoenix associated with
the investigation and members of the U.S. Attorney's Office
there knew on the evening of Brian's murder that the two
weapons found at the murder scene were directly linked to the
investigation by means of weapons trace data. However, this
critical information was not passed to the lead FBI case agent
investigating Brian Terry's murder.
I've also witnessed a continued pattern of abuse and
retaliation directed against ATF Special Agent John Dodson by
members of ATF. Incredulously, senior members of that agency
continue to blame Agent Dodson for going public with the
information connecting Brian Terry's murder with Operation Fast
and Furious. I have watched other agents who were regarded as
``good soldiers'' be promoted while Agent Dodson remains in the
same pay grade, shunned by most of the agency.
Ladies and gentlemen, it's time for the dirty little
secrets of Operation Fast and Furious to be fully exposed. A
number of lingering questions should be asked: Why was
Operation Fast and Furious initiated and then suddenly
concealed by senior members of ATF and the Department of
Justice? Why did the Department of Justice deny the tactic of
gunwalking only to retract that denial weeks later? How many
Fast and Furious weapons have been recovered over the last 10
years? How many people besides Brian Terry have been killed or
wounded by individuals carrying Operation Fast and Furious
weapons? Was there an attempt to keep the link between
Operation Fast and Furious and Brian Terry's murder from
becoming public knowledge? And finally, did senior government
officials engage in behavior considered as obstructing
Congress?
We urge the Trump administration and the Department of
Justice to revisit the claim of executive privilege as it
relates to Operation Fast and Furious. The American public
deserves to see the documents previously sealed by executive
order and for those documents to be turned over to
congressional investigators. We need all of you, both
Republicans and Democrats, to exercise your responsibility of
oversight in this matter.
Brian Terry gave his life protecting the United States, and
he deserves at the very minimum that we honor his sacrifice by
demanding answers to the many questions left unanswered
surrounding Operation Fast and Furious and once and for all
putting an end to this dirty little secret.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Heyer follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Chaffetz. Mr. Heyer, thank you. We appreciate your
testimony.
Special Agent Dodson, you are now recognized.
STATEMENT OF JOHN DODSON
Mr. Dodson. Thank you. Good morning, Chairman Chaffetz,
Ranking Member Lynch, honorable members of this committee,
thank you for your continuing efforts and investigation into
this and the many other matters that come before you. Your duty
is an important one.
I am honored and humbled to have received an invitation to
again address this body and to take part, however small, in
such a fundamental and important proceeding in the governing of
our nation. It is a privilege that I do not take lightly.
Nearly six years ago to the day, I sat at this table with
my fellow whistleblowers as we described for you the ATF's--
excuse me--ill-conceived and deadly gunwalking operation known
as Fast and Furious. Today, I have been asked to return and
tell you what has transpired since, the aftermath if you will.
First, allow me to say that it is not my desire nor my
intent to sit here and cry foul, purport myself as a victim, or
to seek sympathy. Nothing I say here today can compare to the
ultimate sacrifice of Brian Terry or to the immeasurable loss
and injustice suffered by the Terry Family. I am here simply to
tell you my story, and you will conclude from it what you will.
But it is just that, mine alone, just one of many from an
untold number of whistleblowers, each of whom have a story all
their own, some having fared far better, some worse, but each
important, each personal to them, and all worthy of being
heard.
It is my hope that my story will not give cause to dwell on
those things that have already occurred, but rather utilized to
help us pursue a common goal, that of learning from the past to
better ourselves as individuals, as a government, and as a
nation.
Since the moment I first voiced objection to the strategy
of gunwalking and pointed out the all-too-foreseeable and
tragic consequences of it, I began being subjected to
reprisals, initially from my immediate supervisor, then my
chain of command, and soon thereafter, from the uppermost
echelons of my agency, the ATF.
Later, after being compelled to blow the whistle and bring
the deadly ramifications of it to the light of others, to you,
and to the public, I found myself squarely in the crosshairs of
the Department of Justice itself. That decision, the single act
of standing up and saying what we are doing is wrong, instantly
took my standing from being that of an agent of the government
to an enemy of the state.
United in their hubris and without ever once talking to me,
asking me a single question, or properly investigating what it
was that I was actually reporting, ATF and DOJ officials
implemented an all-out campaign to silence and discredit me.
When I began preparations for this hearing, I started to
list the many acts of retaliation and retributions that had
befallen me as a result of blowing the whistle. And truthfully,
that list soon grew much too long and much too cumbersome to be
recited here today before you: no less than three plots to have
me arrested and criminally charged; subjected to multiple
Internal Affairs investigations; my communications monitored
and my activities surveilled; I was lied about, disparaged,
publicly attacked, ridiculed, libeled; I've been transferred 11
times, denied promotion, ostracized, barred from government
workplaces, and banned from public buildings, including those
open to the public, and the list goes on and on. Suffice to
say, the last six to seven years at ATF have not been the best
for me or my career.
Of all the things that I have encountered and experienced
over the past few years, the single most challenging aspect for
me has been the ostracism. When I had a valid viewpoint to
share that was viewed as unfavorable to the agency, I
immediately became the outcast, dubbed the one who can't get
along, accused of being unethical, and became the one whose
opinions and views were not even valued enough to simply be
heard. Open discussion was off the table and the order was
handed down ``Contact with Dodson is detrimental to any ATF
career.''
The ignorant assumptions about my motives and the absurd
judgements of my character being used as the reasons to cast me
out simply are not true. Yet they have been and continue to be
the single most difficult reprisal strategy for me to
personally overcome. You see, the fact is, before Fast and
Furious I was a good agent, experienced and dedicated,
hardworking, and respected. ATF had always been good to me. I
believed that I worked for a good agency, full of good people.
I felt that I was part of something bigger, and I was proud to
carry the badge.
Never could I have foreseen the many twists and turns of
how this would eventually end up affecting every aspect of my
life, personally and professionally. These days, I remain in a
state of purgatory, an agent with no agency. All that has
happened and all that has transpired was not because I had done
something wrong but because I did what I thought was right,
what I thought I was supposed to do, and merely what I thought
was expected of me.
As an ordinary GS-13 field agent, I found myself in the
extraordinary situation, adrift in some deep and unfamiliar
waters and having to navigate the many storms and the perilous
hazards. But this journey, despite hardship, mistake, failure,
and loss, has taught me much more than I ever knew I needed to
learn. Woven in the battered sail of life's biggest trials is
where we can find the threads of life's greatest lessons if
only we are willing to learn them.
My desire here today is to offer insight for calming the
seas for future whistleblowers, as well as helping Brian
Terry's family in getting their deserved answers to the so many
lingering questions. In doing so, I hope to assist this
committee in its prescribed duty of oversight and reform, which
is essential to our government's original purpose, serving the
people of this nation. I welcome and encourage all questions
that will assist this committee in achieving these outcomes.
Thank you, and my wishes for a speedy recovery to Ranking
Member Cummings.
[Prepared statement of Mr. Dodson follows:]
[GRAPHICS NOT AVAILABLE IN TIFF FORMAT]
Chairman Chaffetz. Special Agent Dodson, thank you. Thank
you for your service and thank you for your testimony.
We will now recognize the gentleman from California, Mr.
Issa, for five minutes.
Mr. Issa. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. That is very kind. Maybe
I will start off by saying, Special Agent Dodson, you look
older. It has been a tough six years. Special Agent Heyer, Bob,
you, too, look older. And when we started this, you were
protecting the President. You were a Secret Service agent
heading up San Diego. Now, you are retired. A lot has happened.
Josie, you look a lot older. This has been unforgiveable
and unreasonable to do to any mother, and you have my apology
and an apology I think of everyone on the dais for taking so
long.
But today, I am hoping to maybe give you a little different
view than you would have heard from others. You heard a little
of it from Senator Grassley. What you are going through, what
you have suffered through for six years, at its best you will
suffer through for another two. And the reason is we are in a
struggle for whether this happens to another family. If the
Trump administration were to simply hand over the documents in
a negotiated agreement and the case were closed, a bad ruling
by a judge who was appointed by President Obama would stand not
as a precedent but certainly as something to be looked at the
next time a case came from this or any committee of the
Congress.
Only by having her bad ruling reversed by an appellate
court will there be a clear understanding that the President's
disingenuous, obstructive, false assertion of executive
privilege was wrong. And the remaining documents not handed
over voluntarily or a portion of them but rather for all time,
not understanding that what you have gone through should be
quickly dealt with in a matter of weeks or months because a
court would understand that there is a precedent that says very
clearly the coverup of a crime cannot be held.
Now, to be honest, there is a good precedent. It was
Richard Nixon's case, and it went all the way to the Supreme
Court. In a matter of months, in a fraction of what you have
gone through, the court decided those tapes were to be turned
over. But for some inexplicable reason, the courts have slowed
to a crawl the consideration of these cases.
So I wish I could ask you a lot of questions. I think your
testimony makes clear what you have gone through and what you
continue going through. But if we are going to protect people
like Special Agent Dodson, we are going to need a quick
resolution of what they have given us and not a decade of
waiting.
And, Ms. Terry, Josie, if we are not going to have this
happen again, we are going to need a strong reversal of a
decision that, if you will, codified the wrongdoing of the
Attorney General.
Now, I presented a t-shirt to Senator Grassley, and it is a
little bit lighthearted, but it really isn't. One of the
documents that was covered up was his disdain for this
committee and the work we were doing. Issa and his idiot
cronies was a verbatim of what he was saying, but it was much
more than that.
As you will see in the report that is being published--and
thank you, Chairman, for bringing it to light--some of those
documents that came after my chairmanship was over made it
clear that they had deliberately not searched on the terms
necessary to give the documents that would have given us a more
full picture another form of obstruction of justice. Clearly,
the Attorney General lied to Congress when he made it seem like
he wasn't deeply involved in this when in fact he was having a
daily briefing and update on it.
So one of the things I am going to say today is that I am
calling on the Speaker of the House to stop negotiations with
the Trump administration because nothing the Trump
administration can give would guarantee that another family
wouldn't go through exactly what you have gone through in the
years to come. A quick consideration by a court of appeals, a
reversal and a remand would get you your documents, but it also
would guarantee some other mother, some other cousin, some
other agent wouldn't go through what you have gone through for
six years. Now, that is not an easy request, but I hope, as we
all seek those documents, we also seek a codified solution to
this.
And by the way, when those documents are completely
uncovered, I would hope that this committee would refer for
criminal prosecution the former Attorney General Dennis Burke
and others for crimes I believe they committed. In fact, I
would like to know and probably never will, did the President
of the United States, when he issued a broad executive
privilege, know that it was false and clearly false, as we have
discovered, that these documents were never anywhere close to
what an attorney and a constitutional scholar as he would like
to be known had asserted? Maybe it was just carelessness. Maybe
he did not look and he took the word of the Attorney General.
That is a further indictment of the Attorney General if it
happened.
So I plan on continuing to push this with your help, with
the chairman's help and others, but I would ask you to be
patient because to get to the truth and to a solution will take
time.
Thank you, and thank you, Mr. Chairman, for your
indulgence. I yield back.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank the gentleman.
I will now recognize the gentleman from Massachusetts, Mr.
Lynch.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And I first want to thank Mrs. Terry, Mr. Heyer, and
Special Agent Dodson for your courage in coming forth today and
testifying in Brian's memory. Your experience, I think, is a
painful reminder that we have law enforcement officers
throughout our government that put their lives on the line each
and every day on our behalf. Brian Terry's life, I think,
exemplified this dedication and not only as a Border Patrol
agent but also as a United States Marine and as a police
officer back in Michigan.
I do understand that a foundation has been created in honor
and memory of Brian Terry, and I want to just take a few
minutes today before this committee considering his legacy and
his life and his courageous service.
Mr. Heyer, I understand that you are the--chairman is it?
Chairman of the Brian Terry Foundation and one of its missions
is to provide assistance to family members of Border Patrol
agents who are injured or killed in the line of duty. Can you
tell the committee a little bit about this?
Mr. Heyer. Well, thank you, Mr. Lynch. Absolutely. The
Brian Terry Foundation continues to support the family that is
the U.S. Border Patrol. And, unfortunately, we know deaths are
going to occur in the line of duty, and that's when one of our
missions is to come to the financial and emotional aid of
family members.
And the second big piece would be our scholarship program
specifically designed for men and women looking to go to
college and earn a degree in criminal justice that are going to
allow them to pursue careers in law enforcement.
Mr. Lynch. That is a great way to, I think, carry on
Brian's legacy.
We did have one other issue up here before this committee
that has some parallels. As many people remember, a young man
from Massachusetts, my home State, Glen Doherty, was actually
killed on the roof of the Benghazi compound. He was a CIA
contractor, and so under the regulations, under the base act
of, you know, 1945 I believe, he was ineligible for a death
benefit because of his status. And it was really the work of
this committee and Democrat and Republican working together. We
got the Department to change their policy so that his family
was able to receive the death benefit, as they so deserved. He
was a former Navy SEAL, had done multiple tours in Iraq and
Afghanistan, but, you know, because of the bureaucracy and the
regulations, they were denied justice.
And I just want to say that I would ask the Department of
Justice to review its policies and procedures as well for
responding to families such as the Terry family when Federal
agents lose their lives in the line of duty in defending this
country. I would just say, Mrs. Terry, do you have anything
that you would like to add with respect to how Brian's legacy
might be more appropriately remembered and supported, as well
as his colleagues?
Ms. Terry. Mostly, Brian's legacy is remembered by his
foundation like last year we only got 15 scholarships; this
year, we got 40 so ----
Mr. Lynch. Wow.
Ms. Terry. So the word is getting out. And he was all about
learning, so I think that--I think he would like that.
Mr. Lynch. Is the Justice Department a participant or a
sponsor or a supporter of the scholarship effort?
Mr. Heyer. Not that I'm aware of, no.
Mr. Lynch. Okay. And you are the chairman so you would
know. All right.
Again, I want to thank you for your willingness to come
here.
Special Agent Dodson, how can we help? How can we help you?
You have shown a tremendous amount of courage in calling out
the government when they were engaging in unlawful activity
that endangered the citizens of the United States in complete
dereliction of their duty. Are there things that this committee
can continue to do to help you and make sure that you are
treated fairly?
Mr. Dodson. Well, first of all, thank you, sir. I
appreciate it.
To be honest with you and in short, I don't know. The
problem as I see it or from where I sit is not so much with the
current leadership that we have at ATF. I don't believe they
are directly responsible for any of the acts that have taken
place since they took over the reins. But this culture that
Senator Grassley talked about in his remarks to you is the
problem. And I don't want to be that kind of person that comes
here and tells you about the problems and doesn't offer you a
solution, but quite honestly, I don't know how you fix it.
Mr. Lynch. Yes.
Mr. Dodson. It's this middle management, this core, this
bureaucracy that picks a side. And once sides are chosen,
decisions are made, opinions are rendered, and it's done. And
so--and I don't know how you overcome that. I've been trying
for almost seven years now and have had absolutely no luck in
doing so.
But I appreciate it. I appreciate you having me here, and I
appreciate everything that you guys are doing for the Terry
family and for Brian's legacy. And as much as I appreciate the
offer, again, I don't know. I don't ----
Mr. Lynch. All right. We will keep working on it.
Mr. Dodson.--have any requests of you.
Mr. Lynch. All right. Thank you. And I--thank you for your
service, and I yield back the balance of my time.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank the gentleman.
I will recognize the gentleman from South Carolina, Mr.
Gowdy, for five minutes.
Mr. Gowdy. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Terry, Mr. Heyer, I want to begin by expressing our
condolences and sympathy ongoing for the loss of your son,
Special Agent Terry. And I want to ask you a question in just a
moment, but Special Agent Dodson, there was a franticness, an
obsessiveness exhibited by Federal law enforcement officers
with respect to narcotics, controlled delivery of pornography,
even money, which is not inherently dangerous as firearms and
narcotics and pornography would be, this obsessiveness, this
franticness of never letting that walk. So that would be only
intensified if you were working with firearms.
From the very first moment I heard about Fast and Furious,
it has vexed me how anyone could have ever thought this
investigative scheme was going to work. I don't know how a line
agent would think it was going to work, and that is why line
agents have supervisors and assistant U.S. attorneys and U.S.
attorneys that say, wait, your heart might be in the right
place, but this may be the dumbest idea I have ever heard. How
did this investigative scheme get started? Who thought it was
ever going to work?
Mr. Dodson. Well, sir, I can tell you I can't tell you
where the idea originated from or who was ultimately
responsible for beginning it, but apparently--or what I can
tell you directly is everyone in my chain of command, up to and
including the former Director, was well-briefed on the case,
well-versed on it, and knew the strategy coming and going and
they all thought it was a great idea.
The U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona, as well as up to
Main Justice were--you yourself know the requirements of big
cases or big problems and the briefings you have to go all the
way to OEO, the Office of Enforcement Operations, to do some of
the techniques involved in the investigation that we were
doing, the OCDETF funding that we had, the proposals that were
written for that, it was all spelled out, sir.
Everyone knew it. It was there in black and white. And I
always thought as soon as we got to the next level, somebody's
going to shut it down. As soon as they hear about it, it's
going to get shut down. But that never happened. It kept
getting more funding, more approval, more attaboys. The people
that were running it were called to D.C. several times to brief
it at headquarters, at Special Operations Divisions, and over
at Main Justice, and it just seemed--it was the new strategy.
All the rule books that you and I are aware of were thrown out.
I worked with DEA for a number of years. We were never
allowed to walk dope, not a gram of it. And walking money was--
we would have to go and work a case through a county to get
approval to that. DEA would not authorize it. So, when I heard
that we were walking guns, it was completely alien to me.
Mr. Gowdy. Well, I am glad to hear that because it is alien
to me, too. I cannot imagine letting someone that you even
suspect to be a straw purchaser purchase a firearm and then let
that firearm navigate its way through the criminal element only
to be recovered at a crime scene. I just--I find it
unfathomable that anyone could ever have thought this would
turn out any differently than with the mother of a slain
Federal law enforcement agent and/or ordinary citizen sitting
at a table. I have tried to give--I actually like Federal law
enforcement officers. I am probably biased towards them.
I am just struggling to understand how this ever could have
turned out any other way. As soon as the gun leaves the parking
lot, unless you are maintaining constant surveillance, then you
have lost the gun. And then if it crosses the border, God knows
what you are going to do with it. And then when you learn they
didn't even let our Mexican counterparts in law enforcement
know what was going on, this is most imminently predictable
tragedy that I have been connected with since I have been in
Congress. It could not have turned out any other way.
Ms. Terry, I want to ask you one question, and then I want
to have a very brief conversation with the chairman. For lots
of America, they view your son as a hero, but all they have
seen is the still photograph of a young man in uniform. What
would you like our fellow citizens to know about your son that
they may not know?
Ms. Terry. Brian was--he was like a special, special
person. He was dedicated--he was a true American. He was just
dedicated to his country. He loved to be in the limelight. He
lived helping people, protecting people, and that's what he
always wanted to do.
Mr. Gowdy. Well, thank you. He was wired differently, the
different uniforms that he wore. Most of us are not wired to
want to run towards danger. Most of us are wired to protect
ourselves first and foremost and not others, so you raised an
outstanding human being, and I hope that that provides some
level of comfort to you, even in the throes of your grief.
In conclusion, Mr. Chairman, I would just say this. Perhaps
I have missed something. I thought the administration said that
they were not part of the approval and were not part of the
process and had nothing to do with this investigative scheme.
So, I guess I am vexed in how you can use a defense of
deliberative process if you were not part of the process. And I
would encourage you to share this report with the chairman of
the subcommittee that provides appropriations for the
Department of Justice. His name is John Culberson from Texas.
And I would encourage you to share this report for this
reason: We all have privileges and rights, and all across
America, every day people waive those privileges and rights
because there is an incentive to waive them. I would give DOJ
an incentive to waive their privilege, and I might do it
through the subcommittee chair of appropriations.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank the gentleman.
I will now recognize the gentleman from Maryland, Mr.
Raskin, for five minutes.
Mr. Raskin. Mr. Chairman, thank you very much.
And I would like to start by offering my appreciation and
my continuing condolences to the Terry family. Mrs. Terry, Mr.
Heyer, thank you for coming here today to share your story with
us. Brian Terry was an extraordinary young man with an
extraordinary legacy now, and thank you for putting it to use
for whole new generations of idealistic young people going into
law enforcement, as Brian was.
I also want to associate myself very strongly with the
remarks of Mr. Gowdy. I am dumbfounded and baffled by this law
enforcement technique, which just seems patently ridiculous to
me, but again, I am not steeped in the field but it just
doesn't seem to make any sense, this idea that was deployed in
the Fast and Furious investigation.
We were hoping to hear from Attorney General Sessions
today, but I take it he declined to come or to send someone in
his place. But, Agent Dodson, I had a question for you. On
January 27th of 2011, Senator Grassley, then the ranking member
of the Judiciary Committee, sent a letter to ATF's Acting
Director Melson requesting information about gunrunning
operations on the southwest border. And his letter marked the
beginning, as I understand it, of the years-long investigation
by Congress into Operations Wide Receiver and Fast and Furious.
Can you briefly explain the role of Senator Grassley in
launching the gunwalking investigations and bringing all of
this to light?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. The role of Senator Grassley and his
staff was instrumental, dare I even say lifesaving for me at
some point. They were the only ones at this level--once DOJ had
been informed--you have to understand I was--I didn't
understand the concept either or how this was ever approved.
So, when DOJ--or--and ATF headquarters originally denied that
they were ever doing this, I kept thinking, okay, well, as soon
as it gets to the next level, the next level, then somebody's
going to shut it down and will realize. Well, that never
happened. It was only Senator Grassley's office and his staff
that listened to me and considered and looked at the evidence
and the information that I had and started asking the questions
about it. They were great. And Senator Grassley did it to me, I
believe, for no other reason than it was the right thing to do.
He was in the minority at the time in the Senate, and as such,
he was the minority leader and didn't have a subpoena power.
Mr. Raskin. Let me pause right there because it goes to my
point. He indeed is a great champion of transparency in
government and public integrity, and we owe him a great deal of
credit for his diligent oversight, which ended up exposing this
terribly flawed logic behind the gunwalking operations in
Arizona and led to the reforms at ATF.
Unfortunately, we just learned of a serious barrier to
Congress' ability to conduct exactly this kind of oversight
that Senator Grassley was engaged in. Last week, it was
reported that the White House had directed government agencies
not to cooperate or respond at all to oversight requests from
Members of Congress who are not committee chairmen, in other
words, from the minority side, as Senator Grassley was.
And it appears to stem from a flawed new opinion from the
Office of Legal Counsel saying that individual Members, quote,
``do not have the authority to conduct oversight in the absence
of a specific delegation by a full House committee or
subcommittee.'' I believe this analysis is completely
incorrect, constitutionally unfounded, and will be of great
detriment to the public interest.
Agent Dodson, when Senator Grassley wrote the Obama
administration seeking information about Fast and Furious in
the minority, he was a ranking member, not a committee chairman
as you point out. Do you agree that he still deserved a
response? Do you think it is important for all Members of
Congress to be able to exercise the constitutional oversight
power?
Mr. Dodson. First of all, I also want to say after dealing
with Senator Grassley's office and then Chairman Issa at the
time, he and his staff, this committee staff, took up the
gauntlet and helped us all immensely, and I just want to make
sure that he's thanked as well and your staff and Steve and
just everyone.
But to your question, sir, I am not an attorney. I don't
necessarily know what those decisions ----
Mr. Raskin. So as a matter of public interest, leaving
aside the ----
Mr. Dodson. As a matter of public interest ----
Mr. Raskin. Yes.
Mr. Dodson.--I can tell you what--I found it completely
reprehensible or completely unacceptable to me that the
administration would tell Senator Grassley, the ranking member
of that committee, that he had no business to do oversight and
that they weren't going to provide him any information or any
documents.
Mr. Raskin. Yes. Well, good. I appreciate that. And I will,
Mr. Chairman, ask colleagues on both sides of the aisle to join
me in urging the administration to respect all Members of
Congress and all of our oversight responsibilities, regardless
of the political party we belong to, regardless of whether we
happen to be wearing a hat of the majority or a hat of the
minority. We are all equally Members of Congress. Again, I want
to thank you for your service and the Terry family again for
its public service and devotion to keeping the legacy of Brian
Terry alive.
Mr. Issa. Would the gentleman yield?
Mr. Raskin. Yes, by all means.
Mr. Issa. Maybe a clarification. The odd thing was the
Senator did get an answer as a member of the minority. It just
happened to be a lie.
Mr. Raskin. Well, and that goes to another question, which
I do think that ----
Mr. Issa. So maybe it is about getting the truth in
addition to ----
Mr. Raskin. Well ----
Mr. Issa.--who gets it.
Mr. Raskin.--number one, an answer; and number two, a
truthful answer. With that, I concur. I think that is implied
in the Constitution. The whole Constitution is based on the
truth. It is based on the idea that--that is why we have an
oversight responsibility because in a democracy, the people
have the right to truth.
I yield back, Mr. Chairman.
Chairman Chaffetz. The gentleman yields back.
And I just want to note, as I noted earlier, I agree with
you. I think it is a dangerous precedent and unwarranted and
unfounded to suggest that just committee chairmen can initiate
something that the administration would actually respond to. I
think every Member of this body, no matter which party you
belong to and no matter who is in power, has a duty, a
responsibility, it is one of the core things we do is provide
oversight over the executive branch. It is not just delegated
to 18 chairmen.
With that ----
Mr. Raskin. And thank you for your leadership on that, Mr.
Chairman.
Chairman Chaffetz. I thank you.
I will now recognize myself for five minutes.
Mr. Heyer, I want to talk about your--the family tried to
do a motion to intervene--during this prosecution--let me back
up. The Terry family tried to get some rights from the
Department of Justice. Tell us about that experience.
Mr. Heyer. Chairman, it seems like every interaction with
the Department of Justice became a battle. They fought and
continue to fight every request, every attempt that we've made
to gather information, to understand the aspects of the--why
DOJ did what they did. It's been a contentious relationship,
and that's why I said early on, no American family deserves to
be treated like the Terrys were treated by their government, by
their Attorney General.
Chairman Chaffetz. Now, you tried to receive some victim's
rights, claiming that the Terry family, Mrs. Terry, was a
victim in this case. What did the Department of Justice do?
Mr. Heyer. Well, after much discussion and threats of
litigation, we finally reached a compromise, which it seemed at
a minimum the Department could extend victim rights to the
Terry family. But again, everything was a battle and remains
contentious to this day.
Chairman Chaffetz. The Department of Justice in this case
argued that the family, quote, ``was not directly or
proximately harmed by the illegal purchase of the murder
weapon. The family does not meet the definition of a crime
victim,'' end quote, was the position of the Department of
Justice. I hope that the Department is learning this lesson and
I can't imagine all the horror and things that you have gone
through, then to be denied status as a crime victim in this
case is just--I just really--it is just so abhorrent.
Mr. Dodson, tell us about your personal situation. You have
had a list of so many--at one point I think you said something
like the list of retaliation is so long you stopped counting;
it is almost too many pages to write, being banned from public
buildings, things like that. You are still apparently a special
agent with the ATF, correct?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir, that's correct, although I don't
report to the ATF. I currently report to the FBI office in
Tucson.
Chairman Chaffetz. Tell us about some of the retaliation
that you and your wife and your family experience?
Mr. Dodson. Well, again, I don't mean to dredge everything
back up, but there were several attempts or threats to
prosecute me criminally. There have been at least three
Internal Affairs investigations that I was the subject of that
I know about, and I didn't find out about those until after the
fact. I've either been transferred or had to be transferred 11
times, transferred or reassigned. I have been routinely locked
out of ATF computer systems, barred from ATF workspaces. I was
libeled by the Department of Justice. A hit piece in a major
publication was sanctioned on me. I--it's just--it just goes on
and on, sir. If you could ----
Chairman Chaffetz. What did the inspector general, when
they dove into it, what did they find?
Mr. Dodson. I like to call the inspector general's report
issued on Fast and Furious 512 pages of ``You should have
listened to John Dodson'' because it pretty much substantiates
every allegation, everything that I said was occurring.
Chairman Chaffetz. Do you know how long they conducted this
investigation? How many times did they interview you, that sort
of thing?
Mr. Dodson. I interviewed initially once in Arizona and
then they interviewed me again here in D.C. on the actual Fast
and Furious investigation. I want to say that it began in maybe
January of 2011, and I think the report was issued September of
2012 if that sounds right.
At one point I was involved in including Fast and Furious
six OIG investigations, five of which I was the victim of some
form of retaliation or another on. And if I'm correct, two of
those have yet to be completed or resolved by the OIG.
Chairman Chaffetz. And how many times have you been given a
raise over the last seven years?
Mr. Dodson. I only get the annual COLA adjustment that all
Federal employees get, sir, the cost of living.
Chairman Chaffetz. So you have had no other promotion?
Mr. Dodson. Maybe a mandatory step, you know, I'm a 13 ----
Chairman Chaffetz. But mandatory, no ----
Mr. Dodson. Correct.
Chairman Chaffetz. Yes. Again, something that we as a
committee, both sides of the aisle, we have got to look out for
the people that are whistleblowers here.
And lastly, I just want to say to Mrs. Terry, God bless you
and your family. As Mr. Gowdy was pointing out, you know, there
are some people that run to the call, they answer the call. I
have been in those hills and not the exact spot where your son
was but that is tough duty, whether in the light of day or the
blackness, the darkness, knowing that people are flowing north
with nefarious intent to go out--oftentimes, it is amazing. You
go out, as I have, with the Border Patrol, most of the time
these people are going out by themselves and maybe going with
two or three other people, maybe they are within radio shot,
maybe not. But doing a service for this country that they are
not, in my opinion, adequately compensated for or thanked or
understood.
But I can't thank you and your family and loved ones, and
we feel for your loss. And we will continue to pursue this till
we get to the bottom of it, and I hope that we can fully
provide you all the answers that you deserve, as we should.
And with that I yield back, and now will yield to Mr.
Lynch.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
I know that the majority has prepared a report that has
been referred to several times today, and I just want to say a
few things about it. When you came into this position, Mr.
Chairman, you said that you would do things differently than in
the past, that you would try to work on a more bipartisan basis
when you could, and for the most part I have to say, as a
longtime member of the committee, you have done just that and
you should be commended for that. It is not an easy task, as
the rest of Congress can testify to.
For example, this committee conducted a very good
bipartisan investigation of the Secret Service, and we issued a
wonderful report that was adopted by every single member of the
committee. It was unanimous. It took time to get there, but we
got a lot of investigation, a lot of hearings, but the final
report had so much more authority to the Secret Service and to
the White House because it had credibility that came from
Democrats and Republicans, and we all agreed on that.
So, when we saw this report last night very late, it is
more than 250 pages, of course we were disappointed because we
never got a chance--it is really an issue that you can tell
from the questioning today we all support the Terry family. And
so I know this investigation began with the previous chairman,
so maybe the committee was just deferring to him on how to
handle this process, but it is a shame because I think the end
report, if we had any input at all--which we have not; this is
solely the majority's report--Democratic members who agreed
with you were denied an opportunity to participate in this
report, I think it would have had more force--I think on behalf
of the Terry family I think it would have had more force if we
had been allowed to be part of that. So that is all I have to
say on that. And that is just for future reference.
Chairman Chaffetz. Okay.
Mr. Lynch. And it is not to your criticism at all. You have
been wonderful on this, but this is a little gap that occurred.
The other thing is we heard from Senator Grassley earlier today
that he intended to do a letter regarding the obstruction of
oversight, and I would just ask you, on behalf of Ranking
Member Cummings, if you would join us to, you know, pull this
House committee together and perhaps we could do a similar
letter in support of the oversight. I think it would be helpful
to ATF Agent Dodson and any others who might benefit from
government oversight.
Chairman Chaffetz. And I think that is the spirit in which
we are approaching this. I just heard about this letter that
Senator Grassley is putting together. Whether we in a
bipartisan way join on that letter or we do our own separate
letter, let's sort that out with staff and members here in the
next day or two ----
Mr. Lynch. Okay.
Chairman Chaffetz.--because it should not go unanswered.
Mr. Lynch. I agree.
Chairman Chaffetz. I agree with you there.
Mr. Lynch. Thank you.
Chairman Chaffetz. Thank you.
I will now recognize the gentleman from Georgia, Mr. Hice,
for five minutes.
Mr. Hice. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And with all my colleagues here, thank each of you for
being here and our hearts do go out--there are so many question
marks in this whole thing, and we thank you for coming.
Special Agent Dodson, let me go back to you. And as the
chairman was just saying, your testimony with how you have been
ostracized and outcast and all this kind of stuff is just
inexcusable. You have explained even--in fact, what you just
explained, even criminal charges, attempts for criminal
charges, were those charges related to the whistleblowing?
Mr. Dodson. They were partially, yes, sir, and in
retaliation for it. They openly threatened to prosecute me with
a violation of the grand jury 6(e) secrecy rule. They actually
brought in an FFL in the Phoenix area and attempted to suborn
perjury from him to indict me for witness tampering. They
illegally transmitted classified material to me in an FBI skiff
in Phoenix, which had neither--or I had clearance for but I had
no need to know in the hopes of prosecuting me for either its
mishandling or its release, and they openly and very publicly
tried to or announced my--announced the desire to have me
prosecuted for perjury for my original testimony here six years
ago.
Mr. Hice. And who is ``they''?
Mr. Dodson. Well, sir, that's a good question. It's one of
the ones that we could hope that this committee could
ultimately answer one day. Some of them were members of my
former chain of command. Others were Department of Justice
officials.
Mr. Hice. Okay. I want to come back to that here in just a
few moments.
Are you aware of others besides yourself who have suffered
for coming forward to blow the whistle?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir, many. And there are many that still
suffer. Like I say, my story is just that; it's from me, but
there are other agents that have attempted to blow the whistle
or bring forth, you know, misconduct and mishandling by the
agency, both my agency and other agencies, but they are still,
you know, in turmoil. They're still just getting chewed up in
the gears of government. And it's this cultural aspect of it,
this bureaucracy and the size of the entities that they are
that keeps a lot of them from ever being heard, that prevents
them from getting the, you know, opportunities like I have
here.
And this is one of the reasons that I don't take this
lightly at all. I can't tell you--we could fill this room and
several more just like it with other people that have been
through situations similar that I have that have a story to
tell, and it's just as important. And it's happening to them
every day.
Mr. Hice. And we don't take it lightly either. So you would
say that there are obviously many people who, for fear of the
retaliation, are not going to blow the whistle because they
have seen what has happened to you and others. Would you agree
with that?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. And I can say I don't feel that
anything in any way how ATF or the Department of Justice
handled me or my situation would give anyone the idea that
whistleblowing is a favorable activity.
Mr. Hice. Okay. So those who have been involved in
whistleblower retaliation, are they still at the ATF?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. There are a number of them.
Mr. Hice. Okay. Can you give us some names?
Mr. Dodson. I--could I provide that in another format, sir?
Mr. Hice. Yes.
Mr. Dodson. Okay.
Mr. Hice. Do you know Bill Newell?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. He was my former special agent in
charge.
Mr. Hice. Do you know where he is today?
Mr. Dodson. My understanding, he is assigned to the Salt
Lake City office.
Mr. Hice. All right. So still with ATF? Has he received
promotions?
Mr. Dodson. I cannot say, sir.
Mr. Hice. Do you know Dave Voth?
Mr. Dodson. He was my former supervisor on the Strike Force
in Phoenix, yes, sir.
Mr. Hice. And where is he today?
Mr. Dodson. I believe he is in Minnesota.
Mr. Hice. Hope MacAllister?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. She was the case agent involved in
Fast and Furious.
Mr. Hice. And where is she?
Mr. Dodson. She's still in Phoenix.
Mr. Hice. Do you know that the ATF's Professional Review
Board recommended that Newell be fired and that both Voth and
MacAllister be disciplined?
Mr. Dodson. I had heard that, yes, sir. I don't know it
firsthand but I'm aware of that.
Mr. Hice. Are you aware of any discipline that--obviously
Newell was not fired. He is still working.
Mr. Dodson. That's to my understanding, yes, sir.
Mr. Hice. Would you provide a list of others who are
involved in this?
Mr. Dodson. I can, yes, sir.
Mr. Hice. Mr. Chairman, I think it is part of our
responsibility to find out why Mr. Newell was not fired and
whether or not there was any discipline directed towards Voth
or MacAllister and if not, why not. I think these people and
others that Special Agent Dodson will provide for us need to be
held accountable to the full extent. And I would just ask, Mr.
Chairman, that we follow this as closely as we can and we see
to it that justice is done and that those who are responsible
for this are held accountable.
And I yield back.
Mr. Palmer. [Presiding] I thank the gentleman.
I will now recognize myself for five minutes for some
questions.
And I am going to cover a little different territory, Agent
Dodson. Obviously, the goal was to trace these firearms once
they entered into Mexico, and a number of them were recovered
at crime scenes. Were any of the firearms actually traced to a
crime scene?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir, several of the firearms, a number of
which were recovered at crime scenes in Mexico and some on this
side of the border. And you have to understand the tracing
aspect that you're referring to to trace these firearms, that--
the definition of that is letting them be purchased or actually
facilitating it, allowing it to happen, and going home and
waiting for the crime to occur where they're recovered and
ultimately submitted back to the tracing system.
What happened in the interim we had no idea bout. There was
no full-time surveillance. There was nothing that rendered
those weapons, you know, unfireable or nonoperable. And I've
pointed this out before, that one of the most striking things
in all of this is we're only going to recover that weapon in
the last crime that it's used in, right? How many violent
incidences occurred with, you know, utilizing that firearm
between the time it was purchased and the time it was
ultimately recovered and traced we have no measure of at all.
Mr. Palmer. I ask that question because there were two
particularly egregious incidences where weapons traced back to
Fast and Furious were used in crimes. One was September 2,
2009, in which 18 people were killed in Juarez, Mexico, and
another one was January 30, 2010, at a birthday party, about 60
teenagers. They killed 14, wounded I don't know how many, shot
a lady down, a neighbor, and a couple other young people. And
the weapons used there included weapons from Fast and Furious.
Are you aware of that?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir, I am. And also, I'm aware of several
other incidents where they were recovered. But what I think is
important to point out is that DOJ and ATF have refused to
provide the entirety of that information. These are the crimes,
the atrocities that we know of. How many are there that we
don't of that were recovered and a firearm was traced back to
this program? That information has never been fully provided to
this committee.
Mr. Palmer. That is murder, mayhem on a massive scale ----
Mr. Dodson. It's on a very large scale.
Mr. Palmer.--Agent Dodson.
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Palmer. And obviously, Ms. Terry, we are here about
Brian. Both of these crimes, these murders of these 32 people
occurred before your son was murdered. And as far as I know--I
wasn't in Congress at the time. I came in 2015; I was elected
in 2014. As far as I know, the committee--unless somebody else
has information about this, I don't think this committee knew
about it. And I am going to take this a little bit farther. It
just seems the height of hypocrisy, first of all, for the
previous administration to interfere with the investigation and
the truth regarding Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and his
family, and we owe that to you, but also to have been
signatories to a United Nations treaty banning the
proliferation of small arms. And at the very time they were
trying to push this through Congress, they were trafficking
arms into Mexico.
Agent Dodson, are you aware of any weapons from Fast and
Furious or other ATF operations that entered other countries
besides Mexico?
Mr. Dodson. No, sir, I'm not for sure if other countries
were involved, but I know that this strategy, as it was run out
of the Phoenix office, was referred to as the Phoenix strategy.
And it was being exported to all the field divisions along the
southwest border. This was the golden plan for how--and this is
what it boils down to--to combat illegal firearms trafficking
by illegally trafficking firearms was the model that was going
to be in place. So, Fast and Furious was one case from one
office in one field division. What ----
Mr. Palmer. But there were other operations being run out
of other offices, though, weren't there ----
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Palmer.--that involved Colombia and Honduras and
Venezuela.
Mr. Dodson. I cannot say for sure, but I've heard things to
that effect, yes, sir.
Mr. Palmer. Do we know if the weapon that was used to
murder ATF agent Jaime Zapata was a weapon that came through
Fast and Furious?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir. That's been concluded that the
firearm used in the murder of Agent Zapata was traced back to
the Fast and Furious program. It's my understanding.
Mr. Palmer. As tragic as the death of Border Patrol Agent
Brian Terry is, the deaths of so many other people, not
citizens of the United States, as a result of having access to
firearms provided by an agency of the United States, the fact
that that is not bigger news, that that is not a scandal is
stunning. I think we owe it to the Terry family, but we also
owe it to the American people to get to the bottom of this.
With that, now, I will recognize the gentleman from
Oklahoma, Mr. Russell, for five minutes.
Mr. Russell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And, Mrs. Terry, thank you for being here today. It is
important that we always put a human face back on these issues,
and you not only help remind us of the honor of Special Agent
Terry and his sacrifices but also our responsibility to make
sure that the honor of everyone else remains intact in this
process. And keep up the fight. There are a great many of us
here that intend to keep it up with you, and so I thank you for
your presence here today.
Agent Dodson, you had mentioned in the comments and
questions from Representative Gowdy that the strategy made no
sense, and I would certainly agree with that, that as a former
drug enforcement officer, you would never walk drugs. We would
never see a situation where firearms would walk. And as the
chairman has alluded to and even stated, what would be behind
this and what were the causes of it?
My instincts tell me that, much like planting a gun at a
crime scene to try to affect an outcome that really isn't the
real story, the administration at the time seems set on
planting an idea that firearms from the United States and their
seemingly unregulated flow and ease of purchase were posing a
danger to the drug war and border security as a whole. This in
turn would set conditions to manipulate public opinion to
restrict firearms ownership and their purchase by American
citizens.
I think that is the real story that unfortunately so many
have been caught up in to include you, your service, Agent
Terry, Agent Zapata, others that were caught up in this, not to
mention Mexican citizens and children that were gunned down.
That is the egregious thing. That is why where is so much
protection of this even to this day, that the United States of
America would try to manipulate through walking of guns and
planting in essence a gun at a crime scene to go after
something else.
And I understand your difficulty, and in fact you strike me
as not only a very dutiful man but a humble man, and you are
not here to finger-point, and I appreciate that. Having served
over two decades in uniform myself, I understand that. But you
have an opportunity also to help us get at who should be held
accountable. The honor of Agent Terry is intact. Nothing will
ever change that. But the honor of the family and by extension
of the ATF and its reputation as a whole is not intact because
the family is not being treated as the victims that you clearly
are, and at the same time, the ATF comes under continued
suspicion. With good accounting, then, you know, all the way
back to the first decade in the 1800s when we decided to do
oversight, this is exactly the type of thing that American
citizens expect that we do.
And so, in your view are there people clearly accountable
for these actions? You don't have to name them here, but are
there people clearly accountable that you could name that would
help us restore that honor not only to the agency but to
American citizens and their government?
Mr. Dodson. To answer your question, sir, yes, there are
some individuals that I feel are clearly accountable for both
the flawed and dangerous strategy known as Fast and Furious, as
well as the attempts by the United States Government to cover
it up, as well as for direct acts of reprisal and retaliation
against me.
However, given my position on this totem pole of leadership
being, you know, at the subterranean level, that knowledge of
mine only goes so far. It is incumbent upon this committee and
its members to be able to ferret out that information from
those echelons above John Dodson who, at those levels, are
responsible and needs to bear that burden and those
responsibilities. Again, my spectrum of knowledge in this is
only to a certain level.
Mr. Russell. And I get that, I do. But I also know, having
been, you know, a former commander in a different life, that
sometimes a soldier going to an IG can open up a whole basket
of things. And we have seen an opportunity for that here where
we have seen a Justice Department that clearly lied, put out a
letter that they knew to be false for reasons that are still as
yet to be determined. But again, I stated what my own instincts
are on it and why those decisions were made seemingly very
coincidentally timely with the expiration of the 10-year ban on
so-called assault firearms, lots of coincidences there.
But if you would work with us to help us, as Representative
Hice had also asked, we need that help. We have to be able to
continue to dig. And maybe it is that the people that we are
able to query and we are able to ask, it turns out that they
are able to help us even further. It may not be them at all,
but it could lead to other things. We have to get to the bottom
of this.
And, Agent Heyer, would you care to speak along this line
also?
Mr. Heyer. Congressman, your intuition is right on. You
know, this entire operation, as it was conceived, was
counterintuitive to what we--my 26 years in law enforcement and
what agents like John have dedicated their lives to. It was a
total disregard for public safety. It continues. The weapons of
this operation continue to present a clear and present danger
to law enforcement on both sides of the border. You know, we
even saw through emails obtained by this committee, ATF agents,
supervisors in the Phoenix Field Division celebrating when
weapons from the operation were found at crime scenes in
Mexico, insane.
Mr. Russell. Absolutely insane.
Mr. Heyer. You know, the--you asked earlier about those
truly responsible who they--these individuals are. I think that
the OIG's investigation into Operation Fast and Furious, along
with the previous two reports written by this committee,
indicate exactly who those individuals are. The fact of the
matter was--is no one was held accountable. And that's the true
pain and the truly egregious part of all this. Those DOJ
officials in the prior administration have moved on. They are
now in high-paying jobs in the private sector. The U.S.
attorney in Arizona has moved on without ever being held
accountable. Those senior ATF officials in headquarters were
allowed to retire and move on without being held accountable.
And just as you learned, the agents on the ground level
responsible for Operation Fast and Furious were allowed to take
downgrades and move to their hometowns and move to other parts
of the country, and the case agent was allowed to remain right
in Tucson and continue in her job while the whistleblowers
continue not to look at being considered for promotion and get
on with their lives. So that continues to be a truly egregious
behavior, a part of ATF and upon DOJ as a whole in the
aftermath of Brian Terry's death.
Mr. Russell. Well, and I thank you for that.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman.
And while Agent Terry and Agent Zapata and others, their
honor is certainly intact, one thing we can do is to make sure
that those that were not held accountable, that their honor
will go down in history tainted because it deserves to be so
because of the sacrifices made by honorable agents such as
Agent Dodson, yourself, Agent Zapata, and Agent Terry.
And thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Mr. Palmer. Just to clarify and, Agent Dodson, I really
appreciate your testimony, but I want to clarify that we are
grateful for the recent Department of Justice and OIG report,
which in February released its conclusions that the firearms
recovered at the scene of Jaime Zapata's murder--and by the
way, he was an Immigration and Customs Enforcement Agent--were
purchased by individuals at ATF and the DEA should have been
investigating and confronting. And it had similarities to Fast
and Furious, but they were not ultimately connected to Fast and
Furious. But with that, again, I want to thank you for your
testimony and work that you have done. And you have served with
honor and what you are doing right now, again, indicates that.
With that, I will recognize the gentleman from California,
Mr. DeSaulnier.
Mr. DeSaulnier. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And, first,
obviously, Mrs. Terry and Agent Heyer, there is nothing any of
us can say really but to offer our continued respect and
condolences for your loss and your efforts to make sure that
that loss leads to something better and make sure that another
family will ever have to go through that.
After a yearlong investigation by Ranking Member Cummings,
we issued a staff report in 2012 that found that ATF's
misguided gunwalking operations originated in 2006 as a
strategy at ATF's Phoenix Field Division. The report stated,
and I quote, ``Although these officials claim that they had no
probable cause to arrest any straw purchasers at the time,
allowing hundreds of illegally purchased military-grade assault
weapons to fall into the hands of violent drug cartels over the
course of five years and created an obvious and inexcusable
threat to public safety on both sides of the border, we now
know that the IG has said we have fulfilled or the Department
has fulfilled its recommendations.
But following on the questions from my friend from Oklahoma
and your comments, Agent Heyer, and starting with your, Mr.
Dodson, we get to a larger I think endemic problem maybe
culturally and within these institutions where even Congress
having these multiple hearings, there seems to be--and Agent
Heyer, you sort of hit at this--is that there--part of the
culture is that we will just endure this and there won't be
repercussions. So, the real question is do you think we have
done enough to change the culture so this won't happen again?
Mr. Heyer. Congressman, I'd say this goes beyond culture.
It's doing what's right. It's being honest. We're sworn as
Federal agents. I took the oath. You as a Congressman have
taken the oath. Part of the oath is to do the right thing. And
there are so many examples of officials in ATF, the Department
of Justice, and U.S. Attorney's Office that were involved in
Operation Fast and Furious that did not do the right thing,
especially after Brian Terry's murder. That's the egregious
part. And it goes beyond culture. It's basic integrity, and
that's what was lacking by so many.
Mr. DeSaulnier. So, that brings up the obvious concern is
even if we continue to have these hearings and future
Congresses have these hearings, the problem may go away for a
while, but if we haven't got at the culture of honesty for lack
of a better expression--and this is not just for ATF. We
certainly have it in our political culture. I always think of
President Lincoln saying that he had to do what he did because
that oath he took was registered in Heaven, and in those days
there seemed to be, even with all their problems and civil war,
there seemed to be some connection by a principal group of
people within this institution and others that we would adhere
to that honesty level.
So, the question really is have we gotten to that where
there are enough people who believe in the honesty within ATF
that this will not happen again?
Mr. Dodson. Sir, I wish that I could tell you that it will
never happen again or I even think that it's at a point where
it won't happen again. Nobody would have liked to come here
today and tell you more than I that in the past six years since
the last time I was here things have been great, I've seen a
huge change and they're really, you know, working hard to fix
the problem. I unfortunately can't tell you that. And I think
that even though this body, all that it had done up until this
point, that the culture that is still there still remains.
And there's two prongs to this problem. One of those are
those people who actually took overt acts to try and cover
stuff up to try and retaliate or to try and spearhead this kind
of operation. There are those people with those malice of
intent. Then behind them and where they're able to operate and
get things done is within the culture and the bureaucracy.
Now, those people that did those overt acts that actively,
you know, perpetrated those things may be gone. Some of them I
know are. Others I'm not so confident of. But the culture is
still there, and it's still ripe to do it again. I believe--and
until there is genuine change in that, in how we function as a
government and hold each other accountable and we are held
accountable to the people of this country, that there will be
another Fast and Furious. It will only be under another name.
It will happen with another agency, and it may involve another
commodity. But as long as this bureaucracy, those wheels are
allowed to turn and grind through everyone the way that they
do, even with all that you've done and all your efforts, I
don't think you've put a dent in it.
Mr. DeSaulnier. And I think therein lies the problem.
Unless there are consequences in any field, the generations
that come behind them, even though the rules have changed,
don't see that there are consequences for bad behavior, and
that is just human nature.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'll yield back.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman.
The chair recognizes the gentleman from North Carolina, Mr.
Walker, for five minutes.
Mr. Walker. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Ms. Terry, it is a privilege to get a chance to meet you in
person today. You know, it is not just Brian, as much as a hero
that he was and is, you--and that goes for Kelly your daughter
as well--even living miles apart I can only imagine the
expense, the toil that has been on your family, but you have
kept his flame burning bright. It has flickered a few times,
but I think it is glowing as bright as it has ever been. Thank
you and Mr. Heyer and all those who have just bulldogged this
thing where you refuse--Special Agent Dodson as well--that you
refuse to allow injustice to continue to permeate, even in the
halls of this government. And so I am grateful for that. I
appreciate that.
I am saddened that the former administration, President
Obama included, would work so hard with executive privilege to
keep many of these documents sealed, whether it was either for
the incompetence of the Department of Justice, who did not even
think about or refuse to allow our Mexican counterparts in law
enforcement know that we are providing automatic weapons and
such to drug cartels would be something that most of us would
look at, as far as a commonsense standpoint, I just feel like
the previous Department of Justice owes more to the American
people but specifically to the Terry family and these many
other families who have gone through such tragic loss. But it
goes without saying that what you are doing continues to
celebrate the life of your son, and I think that you are
willing, you and your family, to carry what it sometimes I can
only imagine is quite a heavy load.
I have got a couple questions, just real short. I probably
won't even use the full component of my time. But Special Agent
Dodson, is there anything Congress can do to help
whistleblowers come forward to expose failings like Fast and
Furious, if you could say here is one or two things that I
would recommend, having gone through this journey, here is what
Congress could do to help?
Mr. Dodson. Sir, I think there's a lot that could be done,
but it's going to be like a pretty long and hard road. It's--
but you guys are already doing a lot. I want you to understand
that. Please don't take anything I say away from that. The fact
that people know that there are bodies, there are committees
like this with staffers like you guys have here that, you know,
Tristan and Castor that I know personally and I'm sure there
are others, but as long as they know that there is a place
where they can come where people do care, where they have a
voice, you know, in this government and they can--there are
avenues in place and things, certain protections that can be
afforded to them, that's already huge.
Now, what you can do to make it better and make it more
expanded and to get more people to come in, I don't know. I
mean, it's all part of the mission I guess is how do you get
the word to these people.
Mr. Walker. Right.
Mr. Dodson. And I help you do that. I tell people that I
talk to are those--people have contacted me both officially and
unofficially and asked for my experience and what I've gone
through, there's two things that I want through what I went
through, to help the Terrys get the answers that they deserve
and to help other whistleblowers that find themselves in a
situation ----
Mr. Walker. Sure.
Mr. Dodson.--like I did in the future.
Mr. Walker. Can I ask you a personal question?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Walker. Do you regret coming forward?
Mr. Dodson. Do I regret--no, sir. It's--I don't regret
coming forward at all. I just did my job. I did what I thought
I was supposed to, what was expected of me. How do you have
regret for that?
Mr. Walker. Sure. Well, then let me follow up with this
question. If there is anything that you could do differently,
looking back, if you started this process from the beginning,
what would you do differently?
Mr. Dodson. Well, sir, given the--given what I know now and
the current political climate, I would maybe look for a way to
blame it on the Russians because that would guarantee
bipartisan and it would get the major news media looking into
it asking the hard questions.
But absent of that, I would say, look, I didn't do
everything right. I made some mistakes. I made some decisions
out of fear and anger because there were times that I was very
scared and times that I was very upset. Some of those things I
would do differently. But because I was fortunate enough to
land somehow with Senator Grassley's staffers at that time and
ultimately over here on the committee, they guided me and
helped me and it was--I mean, it was immeasurable. I can never
thank them enough ----
Mr. Walker. Sure.
Mr. Dodson.--for everything.
Mr. Walker. Not to any scale which you have done, but there
was a time in my life where I told the truth and it cost me
something, not to what it has cost you, but I just want to
encourage you today that when you do the right thing, it may
take a while, may even take a few years, but when you do the
right thing, eventually, it is honored. So, thank you again for
your willingness to be able to carry this load. Again to Mr.
Heyer, Ms. Terry, Kelly, thank you all for being here. It's a
privilege to get a chance to be in a hearing with you folks.
With that, I yield back.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Virginia, Mr.
Connolly, for five minutes.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. And let me extend my
welcome and ongoing condolences to the Terry family and Mrs.
Terry in particular and Mr. Heyer representing the family. It
is a terrible thing when we lose somebody in the service of
their country, and on a bipartisan basis, we very much
understand I think and appreciate your loss as best we can.
I do want to say, Mr. Chairman, that if there is one thing
in terms of process that ought to unite us, it is in opposition
to this avowed policy coming out of the Trump White House that
they will respond to oversight requests only if they are signed
by a Republican Member and in some cases chairman of the
subcommittee or the full committee. Had President Obama had
that policy, we would still be hearing about it.
And I will say this. If that policy is allowed to stand, it
invites a similar policy when tables are turned. And that is
not good for the ----
Mr. Palmer. If the gentleman will yield?
Mr. Connolly. Of course.
Mr. Palmer. There was a colloquy between Chairman Chaffetz
and Ranking Member Lynch in which we are in agreement, sir.
Mr. Connolly. Yes. I ----
Mr. Palmer. I yield back.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I did hear that
colloquy, and I also heard Senator Grassley express his
disapproval as well, and I commend that. I just want to get on
the record, though, what I think are the profound consequences
if that policy is not quickly overturned.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman. I think there is a
discussion about a letter from the committee as well.
Mr. Connolly. Great.
Mr. Palmer. I yield back.
Mr. Connolly. And I pray it will be bipartisan because
however conservative, however liberal, however middle of the
road any of us may be, all of us institutionally have a stake
in that. And that is just a mistake. I hope, I want to believe
it is by a rookie White House that doesn't fully understand how
the legislative branch functions and constitutionally has a
function.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman. Points are valid and
very important and I appreciate him making that for the record.
Mr. Connolly. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Dodson, do you consider yourself a whistleblower?
Mr. Dodson. I use that term to describe myself sometimes in
what I did only because I lack another term to describe it. I--
like I say, I consider what I did just my job, sir. I did what
I thought was expected of me, what I thought my oath, you know,
entitled--or made me do and what my duty was.
Mr. Connolly. Did you feel any pattern of retaliation based
on what you did?
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Connolly. And was that retaliation limited to the
office in Phoenix or elsewhere?
Mr. Dodson. No, sir. It was not limited to the office of
Phoenix, and at times it felt--and I believe it came from the
highest levels of the Department of Justice.
Mr. Connolly. And unfortunately, we don't have anyone from
the Department of Justice here today. It would be interesting
to hear from them.
Mr. Dodson. There are several of them that I would like to
talk to ----
Mr. Connolly. Yes.
Mr. Dodson.--myself, sir, yes.
Mr. Connolly. Yes, I can only imagine. So, how did you find
yourself protected? If you don't mind, let's call you for a
minute a whistleblower ----
Mr. Dodson. Yes, sir.
Mr. Connolly.--for the purposes--because our committee
cares a lot about whistleblowers, again, on a bipartisan basis.
We care a lot about whistleblower protection legislation, and
so we want to learn from your experience, which I think is
terribly instructive here. How did you manage to withstand that
retaliation and remain a special agent with ATF?
Mr. Dodson. Well, sir, it was partially because of the air
cover that I got from Senator Grassley and his staff, as well
as from the committee staff and the committee itself. But you
learn pretty quickly that that can only go so far. Those
letters that can be fired off to DOJ or to your agency,
although they can bring attention to it and put things on
notice, when the--you know, in the works of it, it's--there's
not a lot of teeth there.
And you think--I always thought before this--you hear talk
of people who have blown the whistle and they have a
whistleblower card. And you're taught that those people are
untouchable, you know, that their agency can't do anything to
them; they can essentially do whatever they want and they can't
be fired. It's not until you find yourself in that situation
and you realize that that card doesn't make you untouchable; it
makes you unapproachable. And it's those things that the agency
and the Department have done--like I say, all the overt things,
the ways that they tried to come after me, trying to prosecute
me, trying to smear me, to, you know, everything that they have
said, the lies they've told about me, the Internal Affairs
investigations, those things are tangible. Those are things
that you can combat, you can overcome. It's that alienation,
that ostracization that you can't. When people simply won't
talk to you, won't work with you, won't deal with you, you
cannot make them. You can't force that issue, and you're on
your own.
Mr. Connolly. Yes. And I think one of the things implied in
what you just said, too, is you have the intestinal fortitude
to stand up to that and fight back. Not everybody has that kind
of stamina or constitutional makeup and so they can become
victims of that kind of retaliation even though they were
trying to do the right thing. And I think we would welcome your
reflections on--you had the protection of a Member of Congress,
and that is good, but that is not going to be available to
everybody in various and sundry circumstances. So, the question
is how can we create a legislative framework that protects
people who want to do the right thing even if it is unpopular
within their agency and division?
My time is up, and I thank you very much for your
testimony.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman.
The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Wisconsin, Mr.
Grothman, for five minutes.
Mr. Grothman. Yes, we really haven't gotten into a lot how
this happened in the first place or what the motive would be
for the U.S. Government to try to get United States automatic
weapons in the hands of Mexican drug cartels. And it is very
horrible what happened to Brian Terry. I would suppose, given
the zeal with which they were pursuing this, I suppose there
are a variety of Mexican individuals who wound up--unknown
Mexican individuals who wound up being killed today as a result
of the actions of the United States Government. Do you think
that is accurate, say, Mr. Heyer?
Mr. Heyer. I think that's a fair assumption.
Mr. Grothman. Has the Obama administration or anybody
connected with that administration apologized to the Mexican
Government for trying to get automatic weapons down to the
Mexican drug cartels as far as you are aware?
Mr. Heyer. Not that I'm aware of.
Mr. Grothman. Oh, my goodness. Well, somebody ought to
apologize to them. Do you know, because you have followed this
as much as anybody, Mr. Heyer, what would be the motivation try
to get American automatic weapons in the hands of drug cartels?
Why was it in--why did some people in the American Government
think it was in our interest to make sure the Mexican drug
cartels were armed to the teeth?
Mr. Heyer. Well, as I understand it, there were different
ideas. From the Phoenix Field Division, their goal as I
understand it were to ultimately be able to take down a Mexican
drug cartel, the leadership of the cartel. How that was
supposed to happen I really don't know. All we knew was the
first part, they were going to let weapons walk to straw buyers
working for the cartel.
In the bigger picture, with respect to the previous
administration, I don't know. Was it to build some sort of
apprehension to automatic weapons, to strengthen gun laws? I
don't know.
Mr. Grothman. Yes, I mean, people out there throw around
the idea that the hatred of the Second Amendment was so great
in the prior administration that they wanted, you know, people
killed with--or people--they wanted to look like we had a
crisis of automatic weapons here in the United States.
Now, Eric Holder certainly was not very helpful to this
group. We held him in contempt in Congress. Could you just in
general give us your opinion of the degree to which Eric Holder
tried to help this investigation and the degree to which he
tried to stand in the way of finding out what was really going
on here?
Mr. Heyer. Well, I spoke earlier about frustration in every
aspect in dealing with the Department of Justice, and that
continued not only with Eric Holder but his predecessor.
Letters went unanswered, requests for information went
unanswered, and, again ----
Mr. Grothman. So, it appears that he really didn't want to
get to the bottom? He was willing to cover up?
Mr. Heyer. Well, when it came to the Terry family, I
believe they saw us as a nuisance.
Mr. Grothman. Okay. Okay. I mean, you know, I would think
most people if they were President, you know, then they would
get involved and say, hey, I got, you know, a real problem
here. Did you see the Obama administration step up and do
anything about this?
Mr. Heyer. Again ----
Mr. Grothman. Nothing?
Mr. Heyer.--you know, we really felt like we were on our
own, and with the exception of this committee and the--really,
really providing the only information beyond what journalists
were providing ----
Mr. Grothman. Okay.
Mr. Heyer.--that was our sole source of accurate
information with regard to Brian's death and the circumstances
around his death.
Mr. Grothman. Okay. Now, we should see what happened to
Eric Holder here. I was just kind of Googling him, and maybe
you know what is going on. It looks like after he left public
service, he was rewarded by working at Covington and Burling, a
very, you know, top-of-the-line--I don't know what his
compensation is there--but top-of-the-line kind of liberal-
leaning law firm here in Washington. Does that bother you when
you see people like Special Agent Dodson, his career kind of
stalls because he cares about the people and cares about the
future of this country, but somebody who, you know, gets in the
way of this investigation, such a big problem is rewarded by
the left-leaning establishment here in town by getting a job
with a big law firm?
Mr. Heyer. Well, it's not only just the rewards; it was the
lack of accountability. And I spoke earlier today about the
numerous officials that were allowed to leave their positions
within top DOJ positions that were able to leave and move into
the private sector, just like Lanny Breuer, just like Eric
Holder. It was the lack of holding individuals accountable like
those senior ATF headquarter individuals that were allowed to
retire with full pensions.
Mr. Grothman. Okay. Just one other thing. I know I'm a
little bit over. I just hope this committee and whoever the new
committee chairman is does what they can to make sure this is
written in the history books. You know, sometimes, you know,
they say the winners write the history books, and sometimes
horrific things happen and they just disappear into the ether
and future generations will never know about it. I mean, to me,
the Fast and Furious scandal, this should be something, you
know, actually worse than Teapot Dome. I mean, you know, this
should be one of the greatest scandals in American history, and
I hope this committee does all they can so that people in the
future always know the name of Eric Holder and know how little
was done by this administration after they participated, for
whatever motivation, in trying to get automatic weapons in the
hands of the drug cartels.
I would like to thank you, Mrs. Terry, for showing up.
I would like to thank you, Special Agent Dodson. I mean,
you know, I know you are, I am sure, financially not as well
off as you would be if you had just, you know, kept your head
down and shut up and da, da, da, da, da, but of course I am
sure your reward is greater because you know you are on the
side of the angels as opposed to a lot of those other people
who are just grabbing the cash. Thanks much.
Mr. Palmer. I thank the gentleman.
I would like to thank our witnesses for taking time to
appear before us today, and particularly you, all three of you.
You were here six years ago.
Ms. Terry, your strength and stamina and your commitment to
your son's memory and seeking justice for him is inspiring. We
continue to grieve with you, but at the same time, I want you
to know that we deeply appreciate the service of Brian Terry
and how you have honored that service. And in holding this
hearing, I hope at some point that you will feel like he has
been honored by the United States Government.
Mr. Heyer, I appreciate your coming again and Mr. Dodson,
Agent Dodson, for your testimony and your diligence in trying
to shed light on some problems that should have been resolved,
frankly, years ago.
If there is no further business, without objection, the
committee stands adjourned.
[Whereupon, at 12:01 p.m., the committee was adjourned.]
APPENDIX
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