WASHINGTON, Oct. 6 (UPI) -- The new chief of the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives said he's shaking up the agency, hurt by a controversial gun trafficking action.
Acting Director B. Todd Jones said he is undertaking a major shuffle of ATF personnel but has not yet fired anyone, CNN reported Thursday.
Jones announced 11 high-level changes, including tapping as his deputy Thomas Brandon, who has overseen the Phoenix office for the past six months after an internal controversy over a gun operation there.
"These have been difficult times for everyone in ATF because of a case in a division," Jones said, confirming he meant "Operation Fast and Furious," in which ATF agents allowed illegally purchased firearms to "walk" from Arizona gun stores across the Mexican border and into the hands of drug cartels.
The plan was meant to track weapons to the cartels, but thousands of firearms were lost in the process.
The issue came to a head in December 2010, when Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry was murdered and two guns at the scene were part of the "Fast and Furious" operation. Also at issue in Congress is who approved the operation and how soon top Justice Department officials knew of it.
Some Republicans have called for a special counsel to investigate whether Attorney General Eric Holder or any of his top aides knew about the operation early, and could have ended it.
Sen. Charles E. Grassley, R-Iowa, who is conducting the joint Fast and Furious investigation with Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, said in a statement Wednesday he questioning the timing of the ATF changes, The Washington Post reported.
"Rearranging the chairs on the deck won't make Fast and Furious go away," Grassley said. "There is a lot of effort at the Justice Department to spin the fact that the attorney general was less than candid before the House Judiciary Committee, and what better way to make that go away than a bureaucratic shuffle."
