Marriage Made in Hell: Let’s NOT Merge ATF & DEA

William Blake’s “Marriage of Heaven and Hell”

We’re speaking now, because we do not intend to forever hold our peace.

Ever been to a wedding and realized that the marriage is going to be an utter trainwreck before the vows are even exchanged, or the ink dry on the license? That’s a decent allegory for what’s about to happen in Washington, D.C., if the current proposal to merge the ATF with the DEA exchanges “I Do’s.”

The difference, of course, is that the toxic effect of a bad marriage is usually limited to the families involved. Wedding two organizations that are most famous for trampling the rights of American citizens, on the other hand? That has the potential to stain the very parchment of the Constitution in ways that no quickie Reno divorce could ever fix.

Remember how the DEA loves “asset forfeiture”? That business where they can seize your property even if you’ve only been suspected of a crime? They only stopped doing that in November 2024 (hmm, exactly two weeks after Trump was elected, what a coinkydink). Furthermore, the end of that practice was accomplished via memo, not through any sort of legislation or judicial ruling that might enjoin the group from doing it again in the future.

And then we have the ATF, whose brutal and extrajudicial overreach simply cannot be overstated. (The list of their shocking abuses is too long to detail here, but we have a nice archive if you’d like to get your blood pressure up.) From entrapment, to unconstitutional searches, to no-knock midnight raids on the wrong house, Ruby Ridge, Waco … you name it, the ATF has done it.

And none of this, absolutely none of it, is necessary. All of the functions of the ATF and the DEA could just as easily be folded into the Department of Justice. The problem for the bureaucrats at ATF and DEA is that this would mean that they’d be forced to simply enforce existing laws. As you know, that would never do! Both organizations enjoy simply creating new regulations that have the force of law, and then enforcing them.

Remember when the ATF decided to simply announce that stabilizing braces were illegal now? The DEA regularly does the same, simply announcing that a drug that was legal yesterday is now illegal.

Here’s what one of the leaders of Second Amendment rights advocacy, the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA) has to say on the matter.

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CCRKBA URGES BONDI AGAINST DEA-ATF MERGER UNTIL ATF ‘CAN BE ABOLISHED’

The Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms has joined with five other organizations, including the Second Amendment Foundation, in a letter to Attorney General Pamela Bondi, urging her to abandon a proposal to merge the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) with the Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA).

In the letter, signed by CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb, the groups urge Bondi “to consider abandoning this proposal and continue to operate ATF as a standalone agency of narrow purpose and limited resource, until such time as all unconstitutional federal gun laws are repealed and the ATF can be abolished.”

CCRKBA and SAF are joined by Gun Owners of America, Gun Owners Foundation, Gun Owners of California, Second Amendment Law Center and the California Rifle & Pistol Association.

“The ATF has not been friendly to the Second Amendment or America’s law-abiding gun owners, especially over the past four years,” said Gottlieb. “The agency has an unsavory history which includes such debacles as Waco, Ruby Ridge and Operation Fast & Furious, and this proposal would open the door to more abusive behavior because the agency budget would increase and ATF would have access to DEA’s greater resources and staffing. As we state in the letter, the result would be a ‘super-entity of gun control enforcers’ which could be used by future anti-gun administrations “to target the Second Amendment community in unprecedented ways.”

The letter offers a dozen reasons why such a merger must never be allowed in a free Republic, and makes clear that the proposal “does not align with President Trump’s policy agenda.”

“The proposed merger would effectively undermine ATF accountability,” Gottlieb observed, “and result in more agency efforts to erode Second Amendment rights. Such a scenario is unthinkable in a nation whose Constitution and Bill of Rights specifically protects the right to keep and bear arms from government infringement. Instead of providing the ATF with additional funding and the cover of a merger, the ATF should remain as is, with limited funding and scope, under the watchful eye of Congress, which can limit its authority, repeal the onerous federal gun laws it enforces, and even close its doors.”