One of the more amusing names floated for President Donald Trump to nominate as ATF director is YouTuber and former congressional candidate Brandon Herrera.
The AK Guy would make a fascinating choice to helm the agency, in part because he promised to burn pretty much everything to the ground before dismantling the agency. That alone endeared him to me as a choice.
Yet, on Thursday evening, Herrera offered up a video that he figured might be a somewhat controversial take in the gun community. See, he says we shouldn’t abolish the ATF…yet.
Hear him out.
Nothing in that video, for those uninterested in listening, is a defense of the ATF. Herrera, like most of us in the gun community, isn’t exactly a fan of them, even if many of us would love to see every employee of the agency call him “Boss.”
However, he brings up some important points, particularly about how the laws and regulations being enforced by the ATF wouldn’t go anywhere simply because the ATF ceases to exist. Instead, they’ll simply be handed off to some other element, such as the FBI or the Department of Justice. Herrera also notes that both entities have far more resources than the ATF, which means more opportunities to make things difficult for lawful gun owners and gun dealers.
Granted, I’d also point out that they have more crimes to investigate too, so it’s not like all of those resources would be directed toward the gun community, but I’ll also concede that it’s like the ATF’s budget will be absorbed by whoever takes over–to say nothing of many of those same agents simply switching over to the new agency.
Instead, Herrera floats some interesting ideas for what the ATF could do going forward. In particular, have entities like the Firearms Policy Coalition and the Second Amendment Foundation file lawsuits challenging things like the suppressor ban, and then have the ATF actually agree that the laws are unconstitutional.
In short, instead of making the ATF continue along the current track of pushing unconstitutional laws just to justify its existence, use the ATF to dismantle the gun regulatory scheme.
He figures that it can be accomplished in a couple of years.
Of course, he’s also realistic enough to know that such a thing isn’t likely to happen, and I agree with him, unfortunately. Sure, this is probably the best opportunity we’re going to have for some time to accomplish such a goal, but realistically, it’s just not that likely to come to fruition. Too many people are way too sensitive about the media saying mean things about them for some folks to step up and do what’s right.
That said, I think he’s got some interesting ideas on what we can do going forward to restore gun rights in this country. I already liked the idea of him as ATF director, but now I really want to see him in that role.
However, if Trump goes a different direction, at least whoever takes the job has a playbook he could follow to burn the whole thing to the ground in such a way that the gun control effort might never fully recover from, at least on the federal level.
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