The ATF is attempting to block the whistleblower in the Operation Fast and Furious scandal, John Dodson, from writing a book on the gun trafficking scandal, “because it would have a negative impact on morale,” according to the agency.
After first attempting to stop the operation inside the agency itself, ATF Agent John Dodson went to Congress and then the media after the death of Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry, back in December of 2010. The two guns found at Brian Terry’s murder scene were sold through the ATF operation.
Dodson’s book, titled “The Unarmed Truth,” tells the first inside story about how the federal government conspired to sell some 2,000 guns to Mexican drug cartels by running arms across the border, despite evidence the guns killed innocent people.
Dodson submitted the book’s manuscript to the department for review, as federal rules state he must, but it was denied. The publisher Simon & Schuster, did not offer a comment to People’s Pundit Daily.
Greg Serres, an ATF ethics official, told Dodson that any of his supervisors at any level could reject the project “for any reason.”
Serres letter read:
This would have a negative impact on morale in the Phoenix Field Division and would have a detrimental effect on our relationships with DEA and FBI.
Dodson will fight the decision and will be represented by the American Civil Liberties Association when he does. ACLU attorney Lee Rowland says the agency’s restriction is too general.
Instead of providing a specific objection, which would allow for a line-by-line redaction, ATF used a policy that “grants supervisors the discretion to censor critical speech simply because it annoys or embarrasses the ATF,” Rowland wrote in a letter delivered Monday. She added:
Given the national importance of both the Fast and Furious operation and ATF practices more broadly, ATF faces an extremely high burden in demonstrating that its interests outweigh Agent Dodson’s right to speak — and the public’s right to hear — his views about Operation Fast and Furious.
First Amendment rights are especially binding when the speech itself applies to public policy, Rowland said, which demands that the government meets a very high standard when denying. Because Dodson’s views differ dramatically from those of his supervisors at the ATF, his “thoughts and opinions” should not be censored, Rowland said.
The ACLU will argue that the ATF rules are “constitutionally inadequate (and result) in impermissible censorship of the speech of a public employee.”
Dodson says “The Unarmed Truth” will come out in January, with or without the ATF’s permission.
