Latest news with #andExplosives
The Hill
7 days ago
- Politics
- The Hill
Trump is making it easier than ever for criminals to get guns
Campaigning in 2024, Donald Trump made clear where he stood on gun policy when he pledged to 'terminate every single one of the Harris-Biden's attacks on law-abiding gun owners his first week in office and stand up for our constitutionally enshrined right to bear arms.' What he didn't say was that he would enact the most criminal-friendly gun policy of any presidential administration in U.S. history. As expected, Trump and Attorney General Pam Bondi have moved to roll back Biden-era gun policies that took a tougher line on gun dealers who falsified records, on gun purchases that avoided required background checks, and that regulated 'ghost guns' to require serial numbers on formerly untraceable guns or gun parts. Central to Trump's deregulation of gun access is his evisceration of the federal agency charged with administering the nation's gun laws, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. For decades, gun rights proponents have pilloried the ATF, calling it 'scandal-ridden,' an out of control 'rogue agency' that has persistently abused its power, and that had amassed 'a tyrannical record of misconduct and abuse.' To be sure, the ATF has blundered, as when it tragically mishandled the siege at the Branch Davidian compound in Waco, Texas in 1993, and when it botched a covert gun-running operation into Mexico, named 'Fast and Furious,' in 2009. But these incidents, along with the relentless attacks directed against the agency, conceal a very different reality. When compared to other federal law enforcement agencies, the ATF consistently ranks as the smallest and most poorly funded. Its annual appropriations have grown more slowly than any other federal law enforcement agency. Charged with monitoring the more than 80,000 licensed U.S. gun dealers, the ATF barely has the personnel to conduct routine dealer inspections once every 10 years, not to mention the ATF's obligation to inspect the nation's 9,000 explosives license holders. The agency is even barred by law from computerizing its records. Background checks are still conducted by hand at a national tracing center in Martinsburg, W.V., where the sheer weight of its paper records nearly caused the building in which they are housed to collapse in 2019. Routine gun traces can take two weeks. And far from being a rogue or out-of-control agency, a 2021 investigation by The Trace found that the ATF's dealer monitoring 'has been largely toothless and conciliatory, bending over backward to go easy on wayward dealers.' In fact, it found that gun dealers were 'largely immune from serious punishment and enjoy layers of protection unavailable to most other industries.' Now the Trump administration is moving ahead to fire two-thirds of the 800 ATF personnel charged with monitoring gun dealers' compliance with federal law, to cut the agency's $1.6 billion budget by a third, to weaken or eliminate more than 50 existing rules and regulations and to refocus its resources on immigration. While most gun dealers ply their trade honestly, some have been found to flout the law consistently. In 2023, the ATF reported 93 gun dealers that willfully violated federal law. The ongoing evisceration of the ATF's monitoring abilities will have a predictable result of more dealers selling guns to those who shouldn't have them. After all, why should someone bent on obtaining guns for illicit purposes bother with an unpredictable and dangerous black market, the risks of gun theft or other unreliable secondary sources when anyone can more or less put down money at a gun shop and walk off with firearms, no questions asked? As for ghost guns, law enforcement agencies across the country have reported that they are increasingly being used in crimes. From 2017 to 2023, the number of ghost guns found at crime scenes skyrocketed from 1,629 to 27,490. With the end of efforts to serialize guns and parts, expect that number to keep rising, frustrating efforts to solve gun-related crimes. The abandonment of this initiative raises a question without an obvious answer: Why would any law-abiding citizen want a gun that cannot be traced? The protection of gun rights has nothing to do with feeding gun-fueled criminality. From America's very earliest days, governmental leaders enacted a wide array of laws to keep guns away from those considered a threat to public safety, including extensive use of gun licensing dating back centuries. The Trump administration now seems bent on rejecting one of our country's longest, oldest and most important legal and political traditions: protecting its citizens from criminality, violence and threats to public safety. Robert J. Spitzer is Distinguished Service Professor emeritus of political science at SUNY Cortland, and an adjunct professor at the College of William and Mary School of Law. He is the author of six books on gun policy, including 'The Gun Dilemma' and the ninth edition of 'The Politics of Gun Control.'
Yahoo
09-06-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Mass. AG Campbell sues Trump admin over plan to distribute machine gun conversion tech
Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea J. Campbell is taking the Trump administration to court — again. This time over a plan to distribute thousands of machinegun conversion devices to communities across the United States. The suit, filed by Campbell and 16 state attorneys general nationwide, specifically targets the U.S. Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives. In a statement, Campbell's office said the ATF's action involves so-called 'Forced Reset Triggers,' which allow shooters to reach the firepower of a military-grade machine gun. The federal agency previously had classified the devices as machine guns, keeping them off the streets and out of the hands of gun owners. However, the ATF, under a directive from the White House, signed a settlement agreement that would stop enforcing federal law against the FRTs, as they're known, and would redistribute thousands of the devices the agency had previously seized. The multistate litigation seeks to prevent that imminent redistribution, because FRTs are illegal to possess under federal law, Campbell's office said. 'Weapons of war and tools of mass destruction like FRTs have no place or purpose in everyday society—nor in any home, community, or school within the Commonwealth,' Campbell said in a statement. Read More: This $150 device turns pistols into machine guns. Here's why Mass. should worry 'The ATF's actions are a direct assault on every American's inalienable right to feel safe in their homes, schools, and grocery stores—free from the fear or threat of gun violence. I will continue to defend enforcement against FRTs and fight to protect the safety and well-being of Commonwealth residents.' The lawsuit argues that the federal government cannot violate U.S. law, even when it tries to bury those violations in a settlement agreement. Campbell and the other state attorneys general are seeking a a preliminary injunction to halt the Trump Administration from distributing the devices 'in ways that directly harm plaintiff states in contravention of federal law,' they argued. Machine gun conversion devices such as the FRTs have been frequently used in violent crimes and mass shootings, Campbell's office said, contributing to worsening gun violence. Firearms equipped with the conversion devices can exceed the firing rate of many military machine guns, firing up to 20 bullets per second. The ATF has noted a 'significant' rise in the use of the devices, leading to a 1,400% increase between 2019 and 2021, Campbell's office said. The ATF has classified devices that act similarly to FRTs as machine guns since at least 1975, which means they've been banned under federal law. Even so, the ATF has estimated that at least 100,000 FRTs have been distributed across the country. And they have been showing up more often at crime scenes, Campbell's office said. Last month, the Trump administration announced that it had settled Biden-era litigation dealing with the devices, doing so in a way that 'eviscerates' the existing prohibition in federal law, Campbell's office said. In addition to Massachusetts, attorneys general from Colorado, Delaware, the District of Columbia, Hawai'i, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington State, also are participating in the litigation. Mass. labor groups rally against ICE arrest of California union leader Here are 10 NASA missions that could be grounded under Trump's 2026 budget 'I don't know if I want to do this anymore': leaked audio highlights turmoil among Dems Graffiti on tank in Trump's parade calls for hanging 2 well-known Americans 'I would': Trump calls for arrest of California's Newsom amid lawsuit over National Guard in LA Read the original article on MassLive.
Miami Herald
04-06-2025
- Business
- Miami Herald
Son gets call showing duct-taped dad before he's killed in Baltimore, feds say
A Baltimore man lured a father from California to Maryland to discuss their marijuana business, then called the father's son, showing him bound to a chair with duct tape covering his mouth before he was shot to death, federal prosecutors said. Over the FaceTime call, Ziyon Thompson filmed Miguel Soto-Diaz from inside a Baltimore row home and demanded '200 pounds of marijuana and $50,000' from his son in exchange for his father's 'safe return' on May 8, 2022, according to prosecutors. Soto-Diaz was tortured, and when his 'kidnappers' demands were not met, (he) was shot five times,' court documents say. His body was found by Baltimore firefighters, who were called to the home as it burned in a fire, according to prosecutors. Investigators with the city's fire department believe the blaze was 'intentionally set,' court filings say. Now, Thompson, 21, has been sentenced to 22 years and one month in prison over aiding and abetting the killing of Soto-Diaz, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the District of Maryland said in a June 3 news release. 'Murder is widely accepted as the most egregious crime,' prosecutors wrote in a sentencing memo ahead of Thompson's June 3 hearing. 'Here, we have a family that lost a father, husband, and caregiver.' Thompson previously pleaded guilty to use of a firearm resulting in death during and in relation to a drug trafficking crime, court records show. Federal public defenders appointed to represent him, Katherine Tang Newberger and Sasha Garcon, didn't immediately return McClatchy News' request for comment June 4. In court documents, his legal counsel argued Thompson wasn't there when Soto-Diaz was killed and that he did not want him to die. 'Nonetheless, he knows he is morally and legally responsible for a death that deprived a loving wife of her husband and a child of his father, and he tears up when discussing Mr. Soto-Diaz, his wife and child,' his public defenders wrote in a sentencing memo. The filing mentions Soto-Diaz's wife was pregnant when he was held for ransom in Baltimore. Others involved in his killing weren't identified by prosecutors. The month before Thompson was accused of luring Soto-Diaz to his death, he visited Soto-Diaz and his family at their California home in late April 2022, according to prosecutors. Thompson stayed with Soto-Diaz to see 'the family's marijuana 'farm,'' then 'agreed to sell Soto-Diaz's marijuana in Maryland,' court filings say. In charging documents, a special agent with the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives described Soto-Diaz as a 'marijuana trafficker.' Soto-Diaz's son regularly communicated with Thompson for his father because Soto-Diaz didn't speak English, according to prosecutors, who said his son would translate their texts and calls. After Thompson's California visit, he had an issue with 'the quality' of Soto-Diaz's marijuana and came up with a 'ruse' to have the father visit Maryland, according to court documents. Soto-Diaz went to Maryland while believing he and Thompson were going to discuss marijuana sales on May 8, 2022, when he was picked up by Thompson at a Baltimore hotel, prosecutors said. Thompson took him to the Baltimore row home, where Soto-Diaz was tied to a chair, with duct tape covering his mouth and zip-ties binding his hands and ankles, according to prosecutors. After Thompson demanded a ransom payment, he texted Soto-Diaz's son, according to prosecutors, writing: 'Pap said send the bags and money so he can be ok and he said don't call the police or he want (sic) be coming home.' An autopsy revealed Soto-Diaz died from being shot in the Baltimore row home, not the fire that burned the residence afterward, according to prosecutors. In seeking a 25-year sentence for Thompson, before he was handed a 22-year and one-month sentence, prosecutors wrote in the sentencing memo that Thompson agreed it was 'reasonably foreseeable that Soto-Diaz would be killed during the extortion.' Thompson's sentence is to be followed by five years of supervised release, according to the U.S. Attorney's Office.
Yahoo
04-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
ATF warns Pennsylvanians of illegal fireworks ahead of Fourth of July
(WHTM)– The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives issued a warning to Pennsylvanians regarding dangerous illegal explosives ahead of the Fourth of July. The ATF says that Pennsylvania accounted for nearly 20% of all ATF illegal explosive device investigations nationwide since 2020. The ATF says the public is encouraged to report their manufacturing and sales to protect their communities during the holiday weekend 'They are dangerous explosives, not playthings for amusement,' said Eric DeGree, Special Agent in Charge of the ATF Philadelphia Field Division. 'Just handling these devices puts you and anyone else around at risk of serious injury or death.' Close Thanks for signing up! Watch for us in your inbox. Subscribe Now The ATF said ATF Philadelphia is working with local and state fire and police agencies this year to prevent manufacturing and sales of illegal explosive devices, noting that individuals who purchase them are contributing to criminal behavior. 'They'll blow your hand or face off,' said Tim Brooks, a Certified Explosive Specialist Bomb Technician from the Philadelphia Police Department Bomb Disposal Unit assigned to the ATF Philadelphia Arson and Explosives Task Force. He is all too familiar with the danger posed by these devices, whose misuse can be deadly. These devices are manufactured without safety oversight or quality control. The fillers inside occasionally contain small rocks that when bumped together can cause the slightest spark and set these off!' The ATF says that manufacturing, distributing, receiving, or transporting explosive materials without a federal license can land a person in federal prison for up to ten years. The ATF provided the best way to distinguish illegal explosives from regular fireworks: They are sold in a non-commercial location, such as out of a vehicle or residence. The person with the device has no evidence of a receipt or commercial packaging, or they cannot tell you where they originally purchased it. The device is often 1-6 inches long and up to an inch or more in diameter. The casing resembles a roll of coins with a fuse. Some outer shells are made of cardboard tubes. The outer covering is red, silver, or brown in color. The device looks oddly shaped and wrapped in brown paper that may be filled with an explosive material. The public can report illegal explosives to local police or to 888-ATF-BOMB (283-2662), 888-ATF-TIPS (283-8477), ATFTips@ Copyright 2025 Nexstar Media, Inc. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.
Toronto Sun
30-05-2025
- Politics
- Toronto Sun
HAUBRICH: Canadians want Carney to focus on gun smuggling, not gun bans
A semi-automatic pistol with a conversion device installed making it fully automatic is fired as four empty shell casings fly out of the weapon, at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF), National Services Center, Thursday, March 2, 2023, in Martinsburg, Photo by Alex Brandon / THE ASSOCIATED PRESS Most Canadians want Prime Minister Mark Carney to focus on stopping illegal guns from getting into Canada, instead of taking firearms from licensed Canadian gun owners through Ottawa's so-called gun ban and buyback. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. THIS CONTENT IS RESERVED FOR SUBSCRIBERS ONLY Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. SUBSCRIBE TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Subscribe now to read the latest news in your city and across Canada. Unlimited online access to articles from across Canada with one account. Get exclusive access to the Toronto Sun ePaper, an electronic replica of the print edition that you can share, download and comment on. Enjoy insights and behind-the-scenes analysis from our award-winning journalists. Support local journalists and the next generation of journalists. Daily puzzles including the New York Times Crossword. REGISTER / SIGN IN TO UNLOCK MORE ARTICLES Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account. Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments. Enjoy additional articles per month. Get email updates from your favourite authors. THIS ARTICLE IS FREE TO READ REGISTER TO UNLOCK. Create an account or sign in to continue with your reading experience. Access articles from across Canada with one account Share your thoughts and join the conversation in the comments Enjoy additional articles per month Get email updates from your favourite authors Don't have an account? Create Account Recent Leger polling shows 55% of Canadians think the best way to reduce gun crime in Canada is to focus on stopping the smuggling of guns into Canada from the United States. Only 26% think banning the sale and ownership of various models of guns, along with a government seizure and compensation program, would be the best way to reduce crime in Canada. Canadians have the facts on their side: Ottawa's gun ban and compensation program have failed to make Canadians safer for the last five years. The feds originally announced the scheme in 2020 and banned about 1,500 different makes and models of firearms. After multiple expansions of the ban list, it now includes more than 2,000 different types of firearms plus hundreds of different parts and accessories. Your noon-hour look at what's happening in Toronto and beyond. By signing up you consent to receive the above newsletter from Postmedia Network Inc. Please try again This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Since then, violent gun crime in Canada has increased . That's because licensed gun owners, who follow the law to buy and use their guns, aren't the ones committing these violent crimes. About half of all homicides using firearms were related to organized crime or street gangs, according to Statistics Canada . Those stats echo what the police and academics have been saying about the effectiveness of gun bans and compensation schemes for licensed firearms owners. 'There is no evidence that gun bans are effective in reducing this violence, particularly when 85% of guns seized by our members can be traced back to the United States,' said the Toronto Police Association. 'Buyback programs are largely ineffective at reducing gun violence, in large part because the people who participate in such programs are not likely to use those guns to commit violence,' said Jooyoung Lee, a University of Toronto professor who studies gun violence in Canada. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. Federal politicians are finally starting to figure out that the real problem is illegal guns crossing the border. During the election debate, both major party leaders highlighted the problem of illegal guns coming across the southern border. Carney said, 'We have a problem with guns coming over our border.' Conservative Leader Pierre Poilievre said, 'We will secure our border to keep illegal guns out.' In the government's most recent throne speech, there was no mention of the gun ban and compensation program. Instead, King Charles III announced that the Canadian government will 'stem the tide of illegal guns and drugs across the border.' Wasting more taxpayers' dollars to compensate firearms owners for their property hinders the ability of police forces to deal with the illegal gun problem. This advertisement has not loaded yet, but your article continues below. This was highlighted by the National Police Federation, the union that represents the RCMP. In a report, the union said the gun ban and compensation program 'diverts extremely important personnel, resources, and funding away from addressing the more immediate and growing threat of criminal use of illegal firearms.' Taxpayers need a full commitment to end the gun ban before any more money is wasted on it. Government documents show that the total gun ban and compensation program could cost about $2 billion. Other estimates show that the cost could balloon to more than $6 billion. That's too much money to waste on a program that isn't going to make Canadians safer. Police, academics and Canadians know the real danger is gun smuggling, not firearms owned by licensed Canadian gun owners. Despite this, Carney promised during the election to 'reinvigorate the implementation' of the gun ban and compensation scheme. Carney needs to stop wasting money on the gun ban and focus on the real problem of illegal guns crossing the border. Gage Haubrich is the Prairie director for the Canadian Taxpayers Federation Toronto & GTA World World Columnists Crime
