FBI Head Kash Patel Also Named ATF Acting Director

The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) has a brand new chief, but it surely received’t be his solely job.

On Monday, the ATF up to date its management web page to replicate that Kash Patel is now the company’s performing director. Patel, who the Senate confirmed by a 51-49 vote to run the FBI on Thursday, will now oversee his second main federal regulation enforcement company.

“ATF welcomes Appearing Director Kash Patel to ATF, who was sworn in and had his first go to to ATF Headquarters in Washington, D.C. right this moment,” the company posted. “We’re enthusiastic to work collectively for a safer America!”

The transfer concentrates quite a lot of energy behind a fierce Trump supporter with a protracted historical past of bombastic statements, together with false claims Trump received the 2020 election and repeated assaults on federal officers he views as antagonistic towards Trump. Whereas Patel labored as a Division of Justice lawyer and nationwide intelligence official within the first Trump Administration, he has by no means labored on the ATF. The appointment continues the current pattern of putting in controversial political figures over profession regulation enforcement officers on the head of the company after Former President Joe Biden nominated a bombastic ex-agent turned paid gun-control activist and a US Lawyer turned Democratic Ohio Lawyer Common candidate to run the ATF.

Patel’s appointment to the ATF may foreshadow a spherical of firings on the company because it did on the FBI. Patel has lengthy referred to as for the firing of many federal regulation enforcement officers he believes obstructed Trump’s first-term efforts. Within the appendix of his 2023 ebook “Authorities Gangsters,” Patel included what he described as a non-exhaustive listing of the “Govt Department Deep State.” In an look on Steve Bannon’s podcast that very same 12 months, he mentioned he was “useless severe” about going after those that mentioned the 2020 election wasn’t stolen.

“We’ll exit and discover the conspirators — not simply in authorities, however within the media,” Patel instructed Bannon. “Sure, we’re going to come back after the folks within the media who lied about Americans, who helped Joe Biden rig presidential elections,” Patel mentioned. “We’re going to come back after you. Whether or not it’s criminally or civilly, we’ll determine that out.”

Democratic Senators characterised the names in Patel’s ebook as an “enemies listing” throughout his FBI affirmation listening to. Patel rejected that label as a “complete mischaracterization.” He additionally promised there could be “no politicization” on the FBI and “no retributive actions.”

“I’ve no curiosity, no want, and won’t, if confirmed, go backwards,” Patel mentioned.

Nonetheless, Senator Dick Durbin (D., Unwell.) claimed whistleblowers instructed him Patel had been directing the firing of a number of FBI brokers earlier than being confirmed to the director function. Erica Knight, a Patel spokesperson, referred to as Durbin’s claims “second-hand gossip,” and the Senate narrowly confirmed him the following day regardless of opposition from all Democrats and two Republicans.

The ATF has not skilled broad layoffs like another companies have thus far within the new Trump presidency. Nonetheless, the administration has began to make some modifications to the ATF and will make many extra down the street.

On the finish of January, President Trump gave ATF brokers new deportation powers. Initially of February, Lawyer Common Pam Bondi ordered the company to shift its assets away from alcohol and tobacco enforcement. Late final week, she additionally fired ATF Chief Counsel Pamala Hicks.

“These folks have been focusing on gun homeowners,” Bondi instructed Fox Information in regards to the firing. “Not gonna occur beneath this administration.”

For the second, that seems to be the one change in ATF management to date. Marvin Richardson, who seemed to be main the company between earlier ATF Director Steven Dettelbach’s resignation and Patel’s appointment, continues to be listed because the ATF’s Deputy Director. Not one of the different management roles have been up to date on the company’s website both.

Patel has the backing of gun-rights teams and the trade. The NRA referred to as his appointment a “nice first step by President Trump to reform this deeply troubled company.” The Nationwide Taking pictures Sports activities Basis, an trade commerce group, mentioned Patel has an “dependable dedication to defending the Structure and the adherence to the rule of regulation,” and so they anticipate him to roll again modifications made in the course of the Biden Administration.

“Just like the FBI, the ATF was weaponized by the earlier administration. Within the case of ATF, it was to hold out a radical gun management agenda,” Larry Keane, the group’s basic counsel, mentioned in a press release. “President Trump’s appointment of Appearing Director Patel to steer the ATF will return the bureau to its correct function as a regulation enforcement company laser targeted on combatting violent crime and unlawful firearms trafficking, and to behave as a non-partisan regulator of the firearm trade.”

In the meantime, gun-control activists slammed the appointment. Everytown for Gun Security mentioned Patel heading the ATF “makes us all much less protected.”

“Trump is aware of precisely what he’s doing by placing a gun extremist who received’t implement gun legal guidelines on the head of the company liable for imposing gun legal guidelines,” the group posted. “That could be a alternative—one which places our lives in danger.”

Patel has talked about a few of his beliefs on gun coverage and the ATF in recent times. When pressed for his place on the constitutionality of background checks on gun gross sales and the federal machinegun ban by California Democrat Alex Padilla throughout his affirmation listening to, Patel mentioned he deferred to the Supreme Court docket’s interpretation.

“Regardless of the courts rule regarding the Second Modification is protected by the Second Modification,” he instructed the senator.

In November 2024, Patel spoke at a Gun House owners of America convention the place he described his “mission set” as “destroying the deep state.” He attacked former ATF Director Dettelbach for backing the bumpstock ban, a coverage instituted by the ATF throughout President Trump’s first time period earlier than being subsequently struck down by the Supreme Court docket as unconstitutional.

“The director of the ATF principally got here out the opposite day and mentioned he’s all for a bumpstock ban,” Patel mentioned. “It is a political appointee in Washington, DC, who’s imagined to be in control of our constitutional rights. This man desires to take it away.”

He went on to say there’s a “large, huge group” in Washington and past whose pursuits “should not in alignment with ours,” and “they’ll come for you it doesn’t matter what you do.”

“The counter mandate we have now is the pressure of Founding Fathers and the Second Modification,” Patel mentioned. “That’s extra highly effective than any regulation these entities can give you, however if you happen to allow them to proceed to chip away at it, they’ll take it away from you eternally.”

He mentioned one of the best ways of preventing again in opposition to that group was to marketing campaign and vote for Donald Trump.

“If you would like your rights protected and if you wish to wipe out the deep state in a single fell swoop, you, the gun homeowners of America, have that distinctive alternative,” Patel mentioned.