GOA Action Alert

Gun Owners of America

---

Oppose the Cover-up Protection Act

-- Vote could come as early as Tuesday

As we reported to you on Friday, House Republicans got a royal “drop dead" from Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich when he testified before Rep. Darrell Issa’s committee last week.

Weich had earlier written Congress to deny wrongdoing by ATF in connection with allegations that it was intentionally allowing firearms to fall into the hands of Mexican drug cartels. This Justice Department denial by Weich turned out to be false.

Weich had also refused to respond to repeated congressional demands for documents, and documents which he did provide were frequently nothing more than jet-black pieces of paper.

At the committee hearing, Weich told Chairman Darrell Issa and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform that he would continue to withhold documents from Congress.

He also refused to answer questions from committee members such as Utah's Jason Chaffetz and South Carolina's Trey Gowdy.

And, incidentally, Weich refused to provide any information to Iowa Republican Chuck Grassley, on the sole excuse that Grassley was a mere “Republican." If Republicans wanted to exercise their constitutional oversight functions, intoned Weich, they would have to go begging to liberal anti-gun Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Pat Leahy.

So imagine our surprise that the Senate is poised to take up S. 679 -- “bipartisan" legislation which would exempt Weich, his successors, and 203 other similarly situated federal officials from Senate confirmation.

One would think it’s important that federal officials who are responsible for telling Congressmen what documents they can or can't review should be first approved with the “advice and consent" of the Senate.

But for Republican Senator Sue Collins, it’s apparently no big deal. After all, she is a sponsor of S. 679, the legislation to exempt hundreds of officials from Senate scrutiny.

Gun owners who have watched Weich cover up ATF's anti-gun policies -- policies which have intentionally flooded Mexican gun cartels with guns and resulted in the murder of federal law enforcement officers -- realize why it is important that the Senate should be able to block liars like Weich.

One strategy note: We do not expect to defeat the Cover-up Protection Act in the Senate where, sadly, Republican leader Mitch McConnell is a cosponsor. But if we do “respectably” well -- say, we get 20 votes or so against the bill -- it will give us the strength we need to ask that the bill be killed in the House.

The Senate could vote on this bill as soon as Tuesday.

ACTION: Click here to contact your two U.S. Senators. Demand that they oppose cloture on the Cover-up Protection Act.