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Oversight Committee hearing on ATF disrupted by anti-gun activists

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The House Oversight Committee’s hearing on ATF abuses went off the rails on Thursday as anti-gun activists disrupted the proceedings, causing Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs chairman Rep. Pat Fallon to call for five-minute recess as the Capitol Police removed the protesters.

It was impossible to hear what exactly the activists were yelling about while listening to the live stream of the joint subcommittee hearing by the Subcommittee on Economic Growth, Energy Policy, and Regulatory Affairs and the Judiciary Committee’s Subcommittee on Crime and Federal Government Surveillance Chairman, but Fallon first tried to get Capitol Police officers to step in and remove gun control activists Manuel and Patricia Oliver, whose son Joaquin was murdered in the Parkland shootings in 2018, before he eventually gaveled the hearing in recess for five minutes after Manuel Oliver apparently attempted to regain entry to the hearing room.

“You took my son away from me,” Oliver’s wife, Patricia Oliver, said while Rep. Pat Fallon, R-Texas, addressed the committee.

Fallon ordered them to be removed due to being disruptive, after which Oliver shouted something at Fallon.

As Manuel Oliver and his wife, Patricia Oliver, were removed, Manuel Oliver then was detained by police.

ABC News reporter Will Steakin captured video of Oliver’s arrest.

When the hearing resumed a short time later Fallon chided his Democratic colleagues for applauding the Olivers’ disruption before turning back to question the panel of witnesses on the ATF’s overreach in issuing new rules on unfinished frames and receivers and pistol stabilizing braces.

SB Tactical’s Alex Bosco testified to the ATF’s sudden reversal on a decade’s worth of rule making that attaching a stabilizing brace to a pistol “would not alter” the classification of a pistol or other firearm, and told lawmakers that the agency’s new rule puts millions of gun owners at risk of becoming felons if they don’t register their brace-equipped pistols under the National Firearms Act by the ATF’s May deadline.

Boscot said that while he has no issue with the ATF properly exercising its statutory authority, that’s not what’s happening here. Instead, as he argued, the agency is creating new law complete with a potential ten-year prison sentence for non-compliance; a power that is rightfully reserved to Congress.

It wasn’t just the ATF’s rules on “ghost guns” and stabilizing braces that were scrutinized in today’s hearing. Attorney Matthew Larosiere shared personal testimony about how the ATF’s rulemaking has left “lives shattered” and jobs lost because the ATF used minor and accidental paperwork errors to revoke their federal firearms license.

The Heritage Foundation’s Amy Swearer also testified about the ATF’s abuse of its authority, and pushed back on “mansplaining” by Swalwell and others that gun control is somehow pro-woman.

Democrats, meanwhile, largely stuck to their talking points that there’s nothing wrong with the ATF’s new rules (despite what the federal courts have said to the contrary) while wallowing in their own ignorance around firearms, with Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas declaring that stabilizing braces turn “everyday firearms into killing machines.” Who knew it was the stabilizing brace that turned a gun into a deadly weapon? Does Jackson Lee think that “every day firearms” aren’t capable of lethal force?

Democrats like Lee and Swalwell also accused Republicans of being intent on defunding the ATF and other federal law enforcement agencies; an attempt blunt the Democrats’s embrace of “defund the police” over the past few years and to claim that it’s really Republicans who want to take away funding from public safety budgets. Larosiere was criticized by Illinois congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi, for instance, for a tweet he sent out in response to the death of Tyre Nichols at the hands of several Memphis police officers that said “F*ck police” , though Krishnamoorthi and his colleagues like Eric Swalwell chose not to question Everytown Senior Director of Policy Rob Wilcox about the group’s 2021 declaration that “police violence is gun violence” and demanding “fundamental changes to a racist system that perpetuates police violence against Black people.”

The “Republicans want to defund the police” narrative is coming from the White House as well as Democrats on Capitol Hill, as Axios reported on Thursday morning.

The White House plans to claim the recently released House Freedom Caucus budget plan would “make communities less safe” by cutting funding for 11,000 FBI personnel, freezing hiring at the ATF and otherwise slashing money for law enforcement positions and related grants.

  • Some GOP hardliners have been vocal about their desire to slash funding to agencies they view as weaponized against conservatives. Rep. Matt Gaetz has even suggested abolishing several federal agencies, including the FBI and ATF.
  • “These same House Republicans who opposed the President’s bipartisan reforms and are now threatening to defund or abolish law enforcement agencies,” Ian Sams, White House spokesperson for oversight, said in a statement first shared with Axios.

What were we told when Democrats were calling for defunding the police back in 2020 and 2021? It shouldn’t be taken literally, right? It was more of a call to action to “reimagine policing” in order to curb abuses by law enforcement agencies. Maybe that’s how the left should view the House Freedom Caucus’s budget plans; as a re-imagining of the ATF as an agency that sticks to its congressionally-mandated powers without crafting new gun control laws under the guise of rules and regulations.

There was one notable absence from today’s hearing on ATF abuses; the ATF itself. Director Steve Dettelbach wasn’t in attendance, nor was any other representative from the agency available to answer lawmakers questions. Everytown’s Wilcox ended up serving as the de-facto spokesperson and defender of the ATF, but it would have been good to hear from Dettelbach himself about the agency’s license revocations for minor paperwork errors as well as the ATF’s attempts to impose new gun control laws through regulation.

We’ll hopefully get that chance next month. Rep. Jim Jordan and Rep. Thomas Massie have requested that Dettelbach appear before a Judiciary Committee hearing on April 26th to “address the agency’s efforts to regulate firearms through the rulemaking process” so the House GOP isn’t finished with this issue after today’s hearing… though just how open and transparent Dettelbach will be when it’s his turn for a grilling remains an open question.

Rep. James Comer Reveals Treasury Department Has Handed Over Suspicious Activity Reports on Hunter Biden

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The Republican-led House Oversight Committee has been going after the Treasury Department, trying to get ahold of documents and information related to Hunter Biden and his associates.

Yesterday, the Committee subpoenaed the Treasury Department’s Janet Yellen, pushing for information on Hunter Biden’s associates. Rep. Jamie Raskin, ranking Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, announced that the panel had subpoenaed Bank of America. The Committee appears to be looking for financial records related to three Biden associates who were involved with the family’s joint venture with CEFC, the now-defunct Chinese energy firm.

The continued pressure from the Committee has been part of a larger back-and-forth between House Republicans and the Biden administration. The Treasury Department’s refusal to cooperate forced the Committee to postpone a hearing set for last Thursday.

But, Rep. James Comer, who chairs the Committee, has announced that the Treasury Department is now cooperating.

More via National Review:

Comer said in a statement to National Review that the department’s decision to share the reports — which financial institutions are required to file when they detect unusual transactions that could signal illegal activity — comes after Treasury officials previously spent two months “dragging their feet.”

Comer first demanded information from Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen about the Biden family and their associates’ suspicious business transactions in a letter on January 11.

On March 7, Comer asked Jonathan Davidson, the department’s assistant secretary for legislative affairs, to submit to a transcribed interview with committee staff on March 14 to explain why the department had still not turned over the requested information weeks after the initial deadline of January 25. That interview is postponed now that the department is providing access to the reports, the committee said.

The investigation into Hunter Biden and his business dealings is only part of the picture here. The other part is his father, President Joe Biden, and his role in those dealings.

Information obtained from Hunter Biden’s laptop has shown references to his father (sometimes referred to as “the Big Guy“). Republicans have long questioned just how involved with Hunter’s business ventures Joe Biden really was. But Democrats continue to blast the investigations into the Biden family business as politically-motivated – or, as former President Donald Trump might say, a “witch hunt.”

CBS News previously reported that there were more than 150 suspicious activity flags on the president’s brother and son, James and Hunter.

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Oversight Subcommittee Hearing on COVID Origins Reaffirms Lab Leak Theory and Media Malfeasance

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On Wednesday, the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic held a hearing regarding the origins of COVID-19.

The subcommittee consists of nine Republicans and seven Democrats, with Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-OH) serving as the chairman and Rep. Raul Ruiz (D-CA) as the ranking member. Wednesday’s witnesses included former CDC Director Dr. Robert Redfield, M.D., Senior Fellow for The Atlantic Council Dr. Jamie Metzl, Ph.D., and Nicholas Wade, former Science and Health Editor for the New York Times. Paul G. Auwerter, M.D., MBA, Clinical Director for the Division of Infectious Diseases at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine also testified on behalf of the minority.

Full video of the roughly three-hour hearing can be found below, but the subcommittee shared some of the key takeaways from Wednesday’s testimony.

  • Knowing the origin of COVID is vital to predicting & preventing future pandemics
  • Mounting evidence shows it may have come from a Wuhan lab leak
  • The mainstream media downplayed this scientific theory

Of course, none of the above comes as much of a surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention over the past three years — certainly not to readers here. RedState has written extensively on the likelihood that the virus leaked from a lab in Wuhan and the reluctance of the mainstream/legacy media to delve into that possibility, as well as the extraordinary lengths the government and Big Tech went to in order to suppress discussion of the topic.

Still, seeing the matter testified to and fleshed out before a congressional hearing is at least somewhat gratifying. The Oversight Committee provided a wrap-up of the hearing, noting some of the key testimony.

Regarding the Importance of Determining the Origin of the Virus

Dr. Jamie Metzl, Ph.D., senior fellow at the Atlantic Council said in an opening statement, “If we do not get to the bottom of what went wrong with the COVID-19 pandemic, if we fail in our efforts to fearlessly understand all shortcomings and shore up the vulnerabilities this crisis has so clearly exposed, the victims of the next pandemic, our children and grandchildren, will ask us why we failed to protect when we knew what was at stake and had the chance.”

Regarding the Mounting Evidence Pointing Toward the Lab in Wuhan as the Origin

Dr. Robert Redfield, former director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), testified how science indicates COVID-19 infections were likely the result of an accidental lab leak in Wuhan. His conclusion is based on the biology of the virus itself and unusual actions in and around Wuhan in 2019, including gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).

…

Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Colo.) and Dr. Redfield discussed unusual actions at the WIV in September 2019.

Rep. Lesko: “Do you believe we can have certainty that the virus did not come from the Wuhan lab and that U.S. funding was not used for coronavirus research?”

Dr. Redfield: “Absolutely we cannot do that. It’s now declassified now, but in September 2019, three things happened in that lab. One, they deleted the sequences. That is highly irregular—researchers don’t usually like to do that. Second, they commanded the command and control of the lab from civilian control to military control. Highly unusual. And the third thing they did, which I think is really telling, is they let a contractor re-do the ventilation system in that laboratory. There is strong evidence there was a significant event in that laboratory in September 2019.”

Regarding the Mainstream Media’s Insistence on Downplaying the Lab Leak Theory

Nicholas Wade testified about the campaign to discredit the lab leak theory. He pointed out that scientists kept in line with the natural origin camp led by Drs. Fauci and Collins because of their dependence on government grants and that the media failed to challenge the forced narrative.

…

Chairman Comer: “Would you agree that the scientific establishment used the media to downplay the lab leak theory?”

Mr. Wade: “I think the media was used in this particular campaign to establish the natural origin theory.

“The scientific community is very afraid to speak up on political issues. I think the reason is that government grants are handed out through the system of peer-reviewed committees. You don’t want any single scientist on your peer-review committee to vote against, because you won’t get your grant – it’s so competitive. Therefore, scientists are very reluctant to say anything that’s politically divisive or turn other scientists off against them. This means that they cannot be relied upon in the way that we would like them to be independent and forthright and call it as they see it.”

Comer: “Was there science available to make such an unequivocal statement against the possibility of a lab leak that early on in February of 2020?”

Witnesses Dr. Metzl, Mr. Wade, and Dr. Redfield all answered, “No.”

Comer: “Is the possibility COVID-19 leaked from a lab a conspiracy theory?”

Witnesses answered, “No.”

Regarding Gain of Function Research Being Conducted at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Funding of Same

Subcommittee Chairman Wenstrup: “In your expert opinion was the Wuhan Institute conducting gain-of-function research on a batch of coronaviruses?”

Dr. Redfield: “Absolutely.”

…

Rep. Malliotakis also warned that the National Institutes of Health (NIH) may have been funding gain-of-function research on coronaviruses at the WIV.

Rep. Malliotakis: “Is it likely that American tax dollars funded the gain-of-function research that created this virus?”

Dr. Redfield: I think it did, not only from NIH, but from the State Department, USAID and DOD.”

Subcommittee Chairman Brad Wenstrup offered a prepared statement during the hearing which can be found here. He concluded his remarks with this:

These are some of the facts as we know them. But there is so much more to do.

We are here today to try to understand what and why.

It is important to conduct this investigation.

Discovering the origins is vital.

It matters for the future of the world.

And we aren’t finished. We are just beginning.

There will be more hearings. And more inquiries. And more documents discovered.

We will follow every lead.

They’d better.

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