Did the ATF Murder A Citizen? Congress Is Asking

The GunWriter, Lee Williams, talked about the controversial ATF tactics which led to tragedy in a Little Rock, Arkansas suburb, plus some other issues impacting the 2nd Amendment. 

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
All right. We are joined byLee Williams. He's known as the gun
Writer the website The gun Writer dotsubstack dot com. Lee Williams, Good
morning, sir, good morning,how are you. I'm terrific. I
want to get right to your latestpiece about ATF director. What is it

(00:22):
Steve Dtleback? What did he haveto say to the House Subcommittee? Well,
he is not much of a leader. Let's put it that when he
came across as a very weak man. We learned a lot more about horrible
circumstances regarding the March nineteenth swat raidwhich killed Brian Melanowski. Evidently ATF cutoff

(00:45):
electricity to his home before they wentin, making it more difficult for him
to identify them as police officers.After he was shot in the head.
It took fifty seven seconds between andthey kicked in his door and when he
was laying on the floor shot inthe head. Once he was shot,
they grabbed his wife, mayor,who was at the hearing, and pulled

(01:07):
her outside in her bed clothes andforced her into the back of a squad
car where she was held for fourhours. It was thirty four degrees Preston
and she was pleading the whole timeto go check on her husband. That
all prompted Congressman Jim Jordan, whochairs this committee that held the hearing,

(01:29):
to say, if that isn't theweaponization of government, I don't know what
is. You know, I couldn'tagree with him. More. Let's reset
for those that may not be fullyaware of the story the alleged crimes of
Brian Malinowski that forced ATF to treathim as if he was a Jahati terrorist

(01:49):
arch criminal. He sold guns withouta license at a tide before the new
rule took effect. Even though thenew rule has been stayed where it would
be debatable whether he violated the lawor not. He was not selling firearms.
He was not in the business ofselling firearms. He had a job.

(02:10):
He was executive director of the Billand Hillary Clinton International Airport. In
a little rock. He made morethan any other city employee who's paid two
hundred and sixty thousand dollars a year. He wasn't driving his income from selling
guns. He liked to sell guns. He was a hobbyist. He would
go to gun shows and get atable. He also sold coins. I

(02:30):
guess he was quite the coin collectortoo, so ATF surveiled him, put
a tracker on his car, gota search warrant for his phone, and
then they decided to hit his home. March nineteenth, pre dom no knock,
raid, took down the door,rushed in. He mistook them for
home invaders. Obviously that's what hiswife said. I believe her, and

(02:54):
came out with the firearm and theyshot him in the head. I am
there, I am good. I'ma happy example. Glenn Is on nine
to noon I am Stronger every dayon WFLA. He's the gunwriter. You

(03:15):
can subscribe to the newsletter where youget these articles that are second to none.
You just go to the Gunwriter dotsubstack dot com. It's that simple.
Lee Williams with us this morning.Lee. It's bad enough. This
guy had to face off with JimJordan, who I regard as one of
the best we have in Congress.He also had to deal with Congressman Troy

(03:38):
Nells, who, unfortunately for Dettlebacker, is a former sheriff. Share the
opening comments of the ATF director andsome of the exchange with Nell's the former
sheriff. Yeah, devil Bock triesto make this ATF out to be some
type of elite unit. It's not. He claimed. They go after the

(03:59):
trigger pull and shooters and gun traffickers, which he called the worst of the
worst. They don't. He nevermentioned that Brian Melanoski, who has murdered
March nineteenth by his agency, neverhad it been arrested, He had no
criminal record. He tried this crap, saying again that gun violence is a
leading cause of death for children,which it is if you include eighteen and
nineteen year old gang members. ButNells, like you said, former sheriff,

(04:25):
been there, done that, calledabout on it. Nells would not
allow when he was sure of noknock warrants because of their danger, and
he didn't like quote swat teams comingindoors dress like ninja's. He just outclassed
Bock. I mean, they askeddetelback, are you a copy? Have
you ever done anything? He's like, no, I'm a prosecutor. DETTL.
Bock has never been in the field. A lot of the congress people

(04:48):
on that committee had, including Mells. He's a decorated sheriff, bri DETL.
Bock. You should see it.I mean it was like a three
and a half hour here and hejust came across really poorly and constantly tap
danced around the Malinowski death. Weall knew he was going to claim,

(05:09):
well, I can't talk about itbecause it's you know, it's pending legal
matter. Hey, your agency murderedsomeone. He should have been able to
discuss that. Our congressman from thedistrict just to our west, Matt Gates,
asked an interesting question. He asked, how many firearms does someone have
to sell to be engaged in thebusiness of firearms? What was the answer?

(05:32):
I mean, that's what you wantto know, right, I mean,
if you have five, ten,fifteen guns, you come upon hard
times, you want to sell someguns, get some or you got guns
you don't want, you want tosell a few, make some money.
You want to know, you know, can I do this safely with that
atf kicking down my door? Now? Delbot couldn't answer this new rule of
THEIRS. I want to make surethis is clear for your listeners presently,

(05:56):
this new rule about whether or notyou need to get a federal firearms license.
The rule is sixteen pages long,but there are four hundred pages of
explanation, which Dettelbox told the hearingare conduct based, not numerically based,
so there is no number. Thereis no real way to understand it.
Basically, they want everybody who wantsto sell a gun very worried about ATF

(06:19):
and coming through their door, whichis I think why they did the whole
swat team range so they'll go outand go through a dealer. It's incredible
rule. What do you think theoutcome of these hearings? The end result
of this is this going to endin a settlement with the family in a
wrongful death lawsuit with full disclosure.I mean, what are we going to

(06:42):
get? Detlbo's scared because he knowsthat the Malanoski family is represented by a
civil attorney who is the former attorneygeneral in Arkansas where this occurred. The
guy's really juiced in. He wasat the hearing. You can see him.
I have a photo of Devil Bockturning to say he's sorry to Brian's
widow. Mayor and Bud after hislast name, is just sitting right next

(07:05):
to the widow. There's going tobe a civil suit, it'll be it'll
stretch on for a couple of years, and ATF will quietly settle. More
importantly, I think some serious,serious changes are heading his way. This
agency is out of control. Theyalways have been. Waco, Ruby,
Ridge, Fast, and Furious cometo mind. They've never been held accountable.

(07:29):
I think they're about to be heldaccountable. Even some of the dems
I'm hearing are sick of the bloodthirstinessthat ATF has. And you know,
they're not really a real federal lawenforcement agency. They they're brought in to
most cases after the fact. IfDEEA or local law enforcement or local sheriff
department or state police make an arrestand the guy has a gun, then

(07:53):
they'll bring an ATF to trace thegun, maybe it's stolen, or if
they get a fellon in possession ofa firearm, they'll give ATF a call
again after the fact and have themfile some federal charges USLA on your phone
with the iHeartRadio app and on hundredsof devices like Alexa, Google Home,
Xbox, and Sonos. This isChrysler and Ihearts radiosation. Let's talk with

(08:18):
Lee on the break. It's greatfor business, bad for the country that
we have so many stories, somany different fronts that are being battled that
relate directly or indirectly to the SecondAmendment. So we're going to turn this
into sort of a lightning round withLee williamsthegunwriter dot substack dot com. Lee.

(08:39):
Twenty six states have filed lawsuits infederal courts over the redefinition of gun
dealers by the ATF. Where's thatit's enjoined? In Texas? The court
in Texas found that ATF, onceagain, just like I'm bumstocks and frames
and everything else, overstepped its authorityand started making laws rather than simp enforcing

(09:00):
them. So that law and Iknow second then foundation my employer hassued that
law is going to become loot andheld up in the courts. Pretty soon,
United States Supreme Court decided not tohear a challenge to a law in
Maryland that bans the always vaguely definedassault weapon. A little more on that,

(09:22):
Yeah, the law loss. Itwas filed a couple of years ago
in twenty twenty two. It wasrefiled with new plaintiffs after the bruined decision.
Unfortunately, it lingered in Fourth CircuitUS Court of Appeals for two years.
So the plane has got kind ofangry about that and took it directly
through the Supreme Court bypassing the Courtof Appeals. Supreme Court said, nah,

(09:46):
they I mean, they very rarelypressed the will take a case that
has not been fully adjudicated by lowercourt, so they sent it back.
Doesn't say anything about how the HighCourt feels about assault weapon bans. I
think they're going to take up theIllinois case, which is a Second Amendment
foundation case that seems to be thebest one that would accomplish the most in
your opinion. Does Scotus saying no, we're going to wait on the Fourth

(10:09):
Circuit to make its decision, doesit in any way, shape or form,
tell the Fourth Circuit okay, getthis course case heard. Yeah.
I mean that's a very subtle nudgefrom the justices. It's been in the
court for two years, bro.Yeah, how long do we need?
All right? Yeah? Broadly.One of the things that we talk about

(10:30):
with members of Congress that come onthis program is the ever shifting sands of
executive leadership in our country. Onepresident comes in, has this philosophy on
let's use our example, the SecondAmendment on guns, on the atf et
cetera, and does one set ofexecutive orders. The next president comes in
and undoes it all, and thenthe next president comes in and redoes it,

(10:54):
and it goes back and forth.What do we need to do to
stop this ping pong so that ourrights are protected and it's codified in law.
It is codified in law right now. That is a sad part the
Second Amendment, despite what the otherteam wants to say, is incredibly clear.
However, as Justice Thomas once said, is treated like a second class

(11:16):
right and that needs to end.I mean, look at Brewin in twenty
twenty two. That decision said,hey, you can't just willing nearly ban
a fire ements in common usage,and people have a right to carry a
firearm outside of their home for selfdefense. All of these Blue states just
completely looked over that and started institutinganti Brewin tantrum laws and nobody's held accountable

(11:37):
for that. I think at somepoint the High Court is going to get
a little upset and they're going tostart smashing some of these states who are
passing these laws knowing full well they'reunconstitutional. That's what it's going to take.
It's going to take some type ofpunitive action for the Supreme Court.
What is at their disposal though,because almost all courts, especially Supreme Court.

(12:01):
It relies on just adherents. Itdoesn't have a way to enforce it
per se. That's up to theyou know, the the various law enforcement
bureaus or departments, agencies, etcetera to do. So what recourse do
we have because I've always found Democratswill just do what they want until a
court says no, and then it'lljust do it anyway. I remember when

(12:24):
the president, former president sent onehundred and first Airborne Division into a Southern
school because the governor down there didn'twant to integrate. Yeah, unfortunately,
and that's what it took. Unfortunately, the Supreme Court doesn't have a couple
of battalions at its disposal. Butit's going to take an executive branch that
is committed to making sure that theCourt's rules are followed. And we have

(12:48):
just the opposite. Now we haveBiden creating the Office of Gun Violence Prevention,
which you put right inside the WhiteHouse arts to say his handlers did
so that you know that is beingpaid for by your tax dollars. In
my text dollar, there's an antigun office in the White House right now
dedicated to violating your Second Amendment rights. It's going to take somebody coming in,
and I think we all know whothat's going to be. Who's going

(13:09):
to whack all of this crap overnight, and then it's going to be committed
to maintaining and safeguarding the sanctity ofthe Second Amendment without giving anything away,
Lee, what's the next story you'reworking on that people ought to be putting
on their radar. Well, wehave. We're going to continue to pound
ATF over this Malinowski killing like noone else has because if you watch the

(13:33):
hearing yesterday and you saw Mayor Malinowski, the widow, she still has yet
received justice on this and ATF hasyet to tell the truth. Thanks very
much, Lee, appreciate what youdo and as always appreciate your friendship with
us here on the program. Mypleasure. You take care. Thank you,
sir, Lee Williams with us thegunWriter dot substack dot com. These

(13:58):
are see, these aren't just somenovice musings of a guy who cares about
the Second Amendment. Lee's Lee's gotsome chops, he's got the background,
he's got the knowledge, and he'saware of litigation that's going on and litigation
that will be going on. Subscribeto the newsletter. It's one of the

(14:24):
rare newsletters that you'll get that you'llreally be glad you're reading twenty seven minutes
past the hour in the Morning Showwith Preston Scott