The Trump administration is looking to get rid of the ATF. That's the good news.
The bad news is that the way they're looking at doing it isn't by merging it with the FBI, like many of us expected, but with the DEA. This kind of came out of left field.
Acting ATF Director Dan Driscoll talked about it last weekend on the Unsubscribe Podcast and noted that the rationale was that a combined DEA and ATF would focus on the cartels. That's not a terrible idea because the cartels are a serious problem and keeping guns from going south or drugs from coming north, to say nothing of the violence associated with the group not coming north either, is a positive use of these agencies' resources.
But there are issues with this, and a lot of gun rights groups are less than thrilled by the prospect.
The Gun Owners of America sent out a press release condemning the proposal on Wednesday:
Gun Owners of America (GOA), alongside Gun Owners Foundation (GOF) and allied organizations representing millions of gun owners nationwide, is warning Congress and the American people about a deeply troubling proposal by the Department of Justice to merge the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).
The allied organizations joining GOA and GOF are the Second Amendment Foundation, CCRKBA (Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms), CRPA (California Rifle & Pistol Association) and 2nd Amendment Law Center.
In a joint coalition letter sent to the White House and Department of Justice earlier this month, GOA and its coalition partners outlined twelve reasons this merger represents an unprecedented threat to gun rights—consolidating power, expanding federal gun enforcement capabilities, and laying the groundwork for a fully weaponized surveillance regime targeting law-abiding gun owners.
The merger plan, advanced under the guise of “efficiency,” has now been outlined by the Office of Management and Budget, Department of Justice, and Attorney General Pam Bondi. The ATF-DEA merger threatens to combine the agency responsible for regulating firearms with the one tasked with combating narcotics—sending an incorrect and dangerous signal that constitutionally-protected gun ownership belongs in the same category as illicit drug trafficking.
Today, both Senator Jerry Moran (R-KS) and Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC) expressed their concerns and opposition to the proposed merger. As GOA continues to lead the charge against regulatory overreach, we will work with members of Congress to speak out against and shut down this ill-advised expansion of the ATF’s authority.
Sam Paredes, on behalf of the Board of Directors for Gun Owners Foundation, issued the following statement:
“Merging the ATF with the DEA is a reckless move that will supercharge federal gun enforcement. It would hand a future, Democrat-led DOJ a green light to escalate surveillance, intimidation, and prosecutions of law-abiding citizens who simply wish to exercise their Second Amendment rights. GOF and GOA will oppose this merger at every turn.”
Erich Pratt, Senior Vice President of Gun Owners of America, issued the following statement:
“This merger proposal is a Trojan horse for gun control—plain and simple. DEA’s expansive surveillance authority and militarized structure would supercharge ATF’s war on the Second Amendment, making it even harder to hold rogue bureaucrats accountable. Gun owners know exactly what’s happening here: the federal government is trying to build a bigger hammer to crush their rights.”
As noted above, though, GOA isn't alone in its concerns.
“It should come as no surprise that the ATF has not been a ‘friendly’ agency when it comes to upholding the Second Amendment rights of peaceable citizens,” said SAF Executive Director Adam Kraut in a statement. “Their actions have caused chaos for Federal Firearms Licensees, they have repeatedly wrongfully accused lawful gun owners, and, worst of all, their aggressive tactics have caused deaths over perceived infractions. To merge the ATF with the DEA would increase their size and budget at a minimum, exponentially expanding their reach and resources.”
And yes, it would give them more resources. Granted, many of those resources would also be used addressing drugs in this country, but that should still leave plenty to harass law-abiding gun owners.
“We are 100% against a merger that would make an already dangerous organization even larger with more money to back their efforts to infringe on the Second Amendment rights of American citizens,” said SAF founder and Executive Vice President Alan M. Gottlieb. “The ATF’s history of trampling on the right to keep and bear arms is well-documented, and we have requested the Attorney General reconsider the proposed ATF-DEA merger.”
In his capacity as chairman of the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, Gottlieb also bashed the proposal via a separate statement.
“The proposed merger would effectively undermine ATF accountability,” Gottlieb observed, “and result in more agency efforts to erode Second Amendment rights. Such a scenario is unthinkable in a nation whose Constitution and Bill of Rights specifically protects the right to keep and bear arms from government infringement. Instead of providing the ATF with additional funding and the cover of a merger, the ATF should remain as is, with limited funding and scope, under the watchful eye of Congress, which can limit its authority, repeal the onerous federal gun laws it enforces, and even close its doors.”
Now, let's understand that the ATF isn't going to just go away. It won't evaporate into the ether, no matter how much we wish it would. It would be merged with someone else, and regardless of who it merged with, it would still have more resources than it currently does. What needs to happen before that, though, is that the federal gun control scheme needs to be gutted so severely that those resources wouldn't do them any good. There's even a plan for just how that can be accomplished.
That should be done before any merger happens.
And really, the DEA is a terrible idea anyway, even if it's intended to tackle the cartels.
See, the problem is that the cartels are a priority for the Trump administration. That doesn't mean they will be for all future administrations. Sooner or later, we're going to get another anti-gunner in office, and he'll use that agency to go after gun owners and lawful gun dealers. The DEA already has a shaky history as it is, though it's not like the FBI is full of Boy Scouts, either.
There are serious concerns with this proposed merger, and a lot of gun rights groups are vehemently opposing it.
I hope the administration listens.
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