House Oversight Committee Chairman Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., on Tuesday called for a special prosecutor to investigate the growing “Fast and Furious” scandal, in which the Obama administration allowed guns to walk to Mexico, where they fell into the hands of drug lords and were found at the murder scene of at least one U.S. border agent.
Issa complained in a conference call that, “there is ongoing cover up of a pattern of wrongdoing that can’t be explained by any ordinary people (who tried) to do the right thing but made a mistake.”
The Obama administration has been slow to hand over documents to Issa’s committee, and when they have, they’ve been heavily redacted.
“Even though I have subpoena ability, I don’t have the ability to lock people up for contempt until they fess up and give us what we want,” Issa said.
A special prosecutor would have such powers, and would be independent of the government agencies that were responsible for creating and attempting to cover up details of the program.
“We were happy to see the U.S Attorney’s office in Phoenix relieved of these prosecutions so we could have somebody not tarnished in creating the problem also in charge of prosecuting,” Issa said, referring to last month’s news that U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke was pushed out. “But yes, we’d like to have a true special prosecutor on this.”
Issa said he hoped to have the committee’s investigation wrapped up by the end of the year, but the timing depends on how cooperative the Obama administration will be.
House Oversight Chairman Darrell Issa on Tuesday called for a special prosecutor to investigate the growing “Fast and Furious” scandal, in which the Obama administration allowed guns to walk to Mexico, where they fell into the hands of drug lords and were found at the murder scene of at least one U.S. border agent.
Issa complained in a conference call that, “there is ongoing cover up of a pattern of wrongdoing that can’t be explained by any ordinary people (who tried) to do the right thing but made a mistake.”
The Obama administration has been slow to hand over documents to Issa’s committee, and when they have, they’ve been heavily redacted.
“Even though I have subpoena ability, I don’t have the ability to lock people up for contempt until they fess up and give us what we want,” Issa said.
A special prosecutor would have such powers, and would be independent of the government agencies that were responsible for creating and attempting to cover up details of the program.
“We were happy to see the U.S Attorney’s office in Phoenix relieved of these prosecutions so we could have somebody not tarnished in creating the problem also in charge of prosecuting,” Issa said, referring to last month’s news that U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke was pushed out. “But yes, we’d like to have a true special prosecutor on this.”
Issa said he hoped to have the committee’s investigation wrapped up by the end of the year, but the timing depends on how cooperative the Obama administration will be.
