By: Anthony Morelli
There is a serious effort to end the ATF once and for all.
People want the agency gone forever.
And the ATF just received catastrophic news from Congress about new developments in this effort.
During the Biden administration, the ATF was given very wide latitude to go after gun owners, and they took full advantage of this opportunity.
But in doing so, they may have drawn so much attention to themselves that they threaten their own very existence by motivating people to take action to eliminate their agency altogether.
Now there is a bill working its way through Congress that would do just that, putting an end to this agency which was started a few decades ago.
Rep. Eric Burlison of Missouri is very serious about this effort, and he is going to do whatever he can to push Congress to adopt his legislation.
It will be a heavy lift to get this bill through Congress and signed by Trump, but Burlison is trying to increase support for it.
And if enough members of Congress ultimately sign on to the bill and vote for it, there will be no more ATF.
According to Fox News, “House Republicans are pushing to abolish the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) ahead of President-elect Donald Trump taking office later this month.
“Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., is unveiling the bill on Tuesday and already has several co-sponsors in Reps. Lauren Boebert, R-Colo., Mike Collins, R-Ga., Bob Onder, R-Mo., Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., Mary Miller, R-Ill., Keith Self, R-Texas, and Paul Gosar, R-Ariz.”
The hope is that with Trump taking office, there is a much higher chance of this bill being signed if it makes it to the president’s desk.
Of course, that will be difficult given the filibuster in the Senate, but Burlison is certainly going to try as hard as he can.
The article continues, “Burlison said he has not spoken with members of President-elect Trump’s orbit on the bill, but added, ‘I’m sure there’s quite a few people in Trump world that would be open to this.’
“One possible supporter the bill could find is Vice President-elect JD Vance, who previously called for abolishing the ATF and vowed to fight toward that goal in the Senate.”
“The modern iteration of the ATF was formed as a bureau under the Treasury Department in 1972. It was transferred to the Department of Justice in 2003 as a law enforcement agency after laws on gun control and explosives were added to the ATF’s purview in the 1990s.”
If the ATF wants to continue existing, it would be in their best interests to let go of their extreme attacks on guns and keep a much lower profile.
When people feel attacked, they have a tendency to want to respond, and that is exactly how gun owners have reacted to the attacks by the ATF on their freedoms.
Now there is a serious push to eliminate the agency altogether, and it seems that the number of supporters is growing.