MARCH 29, 2025
Trump Administration FBI Director appointee Kash Patel.
In late February, President Donald Trump made an unusual announcement: FBI Director Kash Patel would also serve as interim head of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives.
That put Patel in charge of two Justice Department subagencies with two distinct missions — and no public mandate on how he would divide his time.
The next day, Patel arrived at ATF’s Northeast Washington headquarters, snapped photos in the lobby, met career leaders and commended their work, according to multiple people familiar with the visit.
But since then, Patel has not returned, and there appears to be scant communication between the acting director and the people who work for the 5,000-person agency, said the people familiar with the situation, who like some others interviewed for this article spoke on the condition of anonymity to offer information on a sensitive matter they were not authorized to discuss.
Patel’s absence is reflective of the uncertainty hovering over ATF, a relatively small law enforcement entity that has bubbled into a political juggernaut, touted by Democrats as critical to combating gun violence and accused by Republicans of trying to overregulate firearms.
Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche this week proposed merging it with the Drug Enforcement Administration, according to a memo to Justice Department leaders obtained by The Washington Post. Critics of the idea fear it would lead to a reduction in ATF staffing.
Patel has already proposed sending some ATF agents to work on border issues.
CNN reported this weekend that Patel and his aides had considered detailing more than 1,000 people from the agency to work with the FBI on the border. A person familiar with the matter confirmed to The Post that number was floated.
Patel and other officials denied the report. The agency said 150 ATF agents would be sent.
“It is important to clarify that this is a temporary reassignment of resources to bolster public safety and combat criminal organizations more effectively,” an ATF spokeswoman said in a statement.
ATF is responsible for regulating the sales and licensing of firearms based on laws passed by Congress and working with local law enforcement to solve gun crimes. Gun-control opponents say the agency takes a partisan approach to regulations that go beyond what the Second Amendment allows.
During the Biden administration, Congress slashed ATF’s budget, preventing the agency from filling positions of people who retired or left. Agency advocates say further reductions could hamper ATF’s ability to effectively operate.
So far, day-to-day operations have been fairly typical, according to people familiar with the agency, with Marvin G. Richardson, a department veteran, informally serving as the de facto head. ATF agents have been showing up to crime scenes and assisting with violent gun crimes across the country.
The FBI announced a task force that would work with ATF to address what Attorney General Pam Bondi has characterized as politically motivated attacks with homemade explosives on Tesla vehicles — a company owned by Trump ally Elon Musk.
But agency leaders have little contact with top Trump appointees at Justice or input into the administration’s anti-violence or gun-related plans, people familiar with the situation said.
While Blanche’s memo did not say whether the agency’s staffing would be cut, Emma Brown, executive director of the gun-control advocacy group GIFFORDS, expressed concern that combining ATF and DEA would ultimately lead to fewer agents and resources.
“We want the ATF to be equipped with enough agents and resources to protect America from violent crime,” Brown said. “Putting someone in charge of it who has a full-time job somewhere else is not how you treat a serious law enforcement agency.”
Uncertainty about ATF’s future has been percolating for weeks. After a recent town hall on the Trump administration’s government-cutting effort, Arizona Attorney General Kris Mayes (D) told reporters about a conversation she’d had with acting DEA administrator Derek Maltz in which he said staffing at both agencies was up in the air.
Mayes said she asked Maltz for more agents to help combat deadly drug trafficking operations in the state as part of a federal-local task force that includes both DEA and ATF. Maltz responded that he couldn’t make any promises, Mayes said, and added that he wasn’t even sure that ATF would exist in the coming months.
The DEA declined to comment.
Luis Valdes — a former police officer and spokesman for the gun-rights advocacy group, Gunowners of America — said his group would like to see ATF abolished, and to have the Trump administration rescind the agency’s gun regulations as an initial step. One of those regulations, requiring serial numbers and background checks for ghost guns, was upheld by the Supreme Court on Wednesday. The Justice Department has declined to comment on whether it will keep the regulation in place.
“We would like to have ATF disbanded, that is the last step actually, not the first step. But the bigger issue is all the laws on the book,” Valdes said. “We would like to see all the draconian policies that ATF has created themselves to be repealed.”
ATF has had just two Senate-approved directors since the position started requiring such confirmation in 2006 — a sign of the political thorniness of leading the organization. The Biden administration withdrew its first pick to serve in the post — David Chipman — after bipartisan pushback over his gun-control advocacy. Biden’s second pick, former prosecutor Steven Dettlebach, was confirmed and served for more than two years.
Multiple people familiar with hiring process said the Trump administration has interviewed candidates to lead the agency, but the president so far has not nominated anyone. The administration hasn’t made major personnel changes at ATF during its first two months, though there have been some shake-ups.
Attorney General Pam Bondi speaks during the swearing-in ceremony for FBI Director Kash Patel on Feb. 21. – Mark Schiefelbein/AP
Bondi fired Pamela Hicks, ATF’s general counsel and a 23-year veteran of the agency, on one of her first days leading the Justice Department. Hicks was replaced with Robert Leider, law professor at the Anton Scalia School of Law and a Second Amendment advocate. Leon Spears — a firearms instructor and advocate who is known as the first person in D.C. to receive a concealed carry permit — was installed as an adviser to agency leaders.
“The Administration knows that ATF is unpopular with the base … but that it also performs some critical law enforcement functions,” texted one person who is close to the Trump administration and has had conversations about the agency’s future.
“By tapping Patel as Acting Director, the President may well be telegraphing his intent to eventually abolish the ATF, first by eliminating its bad parts and then by folding the good parts, like the arson and ballistics labs, into the FBI,” this person added.
As attorney general, Bondi has wide discretion to shape ATF, a power not usually shared by the FBI director. If the agency remains intact, one of her biggest decisions would be whether to recommend that Trump choose a veteran law enforcement official or someone who is an advocate on gun-related issues to head the agency.
Multiple people familiar with her thinking said Bondi wants a traditional law enforcement official as director. It is not clear whether Patel — who has been associated with some of the most ardent advocates for looser gun regulations — may have a different vision.
“The Department of Justice and all its law enforcement components are working tirelessly to make America safe again,” a Justice Department spokesman said in a statement.
“As Director Patel has stated previously, the brave men and women at ATF who courageously dedicate themselves to protecting the American public are a critical part of the new FBI’s mission,” FBI spokesman Ben Williamson said. “We look forward to continuing our partnership in the days ahead.”
Since Trump took office, ATF has been consulted about regulations that would give the attorney general authority to provide a pathway for convicted felons to regain their right to own firearms, according to a person familiar with the matter.
That effort came under scrutiny following the ouster of the Justice Department’s pardon attorney this month. Elizabeth Oyer said she was terminated after she refused to back restoring firearm rights to Mel Gibson, an actor and staunch Trump supporter who has been barred from owning a gun since he was convicted on a domestic violence charge.
The agency has also released updated guidelines on forced reset triggers, an accessory gun owners can use to make semiautomatic weapons fire more rapidly, essentially transforming them into automatic weapons.
In 2022, ATF said the triggers qualified as automatic weapons, the production of which have been banned by Congress. Two separate lawsuits during the Biden administration challenged this classification. A federal court in New York upheld ATF’s prohibition of the devices, while a court in Texas said ATF’s classification was unconstitutional.
David Warrington, one of the lawyers who sued the Biden administration over its rule on forced reset triggers, is now a top legal adviser in Trump’s White House.
ATF guidelines, released in February, highlighted the Texas ruling, a sign that the agency might move to rescind its regulations.
On social media, some Trump allies have suggested that the president should eliminate the agency altogether — as it has attempted to do with the Education Department and other agencies.
After the White House announced that it would gut the pro-democracy international news service Voice of America, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) asked on social media what other agencies should be weakened or shut down.
Trump ally Kari Lake — the president’s pick to head Voice of America, who is now helping direct its attempted shutdown — had a decisive response on social media: “IRS & ATF.”
Courtesy/Source: Washington Post
