Tennessee congressman proposes defunding the ATF

Publish date: 2024-04-23

WILLIAMSON COUNTY, Tenn. (WZTV) — Gun reform advocates gathered in Franklin, Tennessee, on Friday, calling for change to the state's gun laws following the Covenant School mass shooting.

Covenant parent Sarah Neumann stepped up to the podium, asking people to come together and find ways to protect people gun violence.

It's about keeping the hand guns out of the hands of the wrong people. As a responsible gun owner, we're not targeting you,” Neumann said.

The message is echoed by Tennessean Kari Keuffler, who survived the Las Vegas festival shooting in 2017 and is still haunted by it.

“When I go out with my friends and we're hanging out at just dinner or a movie, I'm wondering what's going to happen next, right? There's the ripple effect is so large,” Keuffler said.

Despite these pleas, one Nashville Congressman is calling for less oversight on guns.

Rep. Andy Ogles, R-Tenn., is calling for a hiring freeze at the bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, known as the ATF. The agency investigates federal offenses involving illegal use of guns.

The agency is charged in part with curbing illegal gun use and gun trafficking. Federal data shows the agency helped track more than 15,000 guns to Tennessee in 2021. It also helps investigate federal crimes, and was on scene the day of the Covenant School shooting.

Ogles said the ATF is one of three “woke” government agencies that he wants to defund.

The ATF has a history of reckless incompetence and proposals to infringe on the Second Amendment rights of Americans. The last thing the country needs is more federal agents threatening the rights of the people,” Ogles said in a statement. “Imposing hiring freezes in agencies that never should have been created to begin with is just the first step of several that need to be taken for the sake of the American people. It’s time to stop using taxpayer dollars to fund federal corruption.”

WZTV contacted Ogles’ office for an interview but did not hear back.

He addressed the idea in a recent hearing.

“They’ve been weaponized like other agencies against the American people, they’ve been regulating the American people by press release and fiat and not going through the proper channels of the congressional approvement process,” Ogles said.

Some Tennesseans disagree with the idea, like gun reform advocate Chandler Quaile.

“It's another Republican attack on gun sense reform and extremely popular agencies within the federal government under the guise of fiscal responsibility and fiscal conservatism,” Quaile said.

But others support the idea.

Tennessee Firearms Association Executive Director John Harris says the ATF unfairly targets gun manufacturers and dealers, disrupting the firearm supply chain and infringing on constitutional rights.

Efforts like Congressman Ogles to curtail the size, the authority, the budget, or even the existence of the ATF, is something that the second amendment may call for, Congress should take a look at doing more,” Harris said.

A representative from the ATF declined to comment on this story.

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