(WASHINGTON) — President Joe Biden has tested positive again for COVID-19, according to a letter from White House physician Dr. Kevin O’Connor.
O’Connor said Biden’s antigen test came back positive late Saturday morning after he tested negative Tuesday evening, Wednesday morning, Thursday morning and Friday morning.
This is a developing story. Please check back for updates.
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(NEW YORK) — As the federal government aims at expanding protections for LGBTQ people, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and state agencies are vowing to dodge those safeguards.
In a memo from the Florida education department on Thursday, the agency told state schools to ignore nondiscrimination guidance from the U.S. Department of Education and Department of Agriculture.
The federal guidance stated that schools cannot discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity under Title IX, as the definition of “sex” includes such categories.
Several federal agencies have issued similar guidance.
DeSantis’ office expressed its support in the education department’s memo in a statement to ABC News.
“The governor’s office fully supports the Florida Department of Education in its position on these proposed rule changes and stands with Commissioner Diaz in refusing to allow the federal government and the Florida Commissioner of Agriculture to hold vulnerable students hostage to their political agenda,” said the governor’s office.
The news comes as Florida’s Agency for Healthcare Administration proposed a ban on Medicaid coverage for puberty blockers, hormones, sex reassignment surgeries, and “any other procedures that alter primary or secondary sexual characteristics.”
The AHCA is debating whether gender-affirming care falls under the “Generally Accepted Professional Medical Standards” for trans Medicaid recipients.
Simultaneously, the state’s health department has asked the Florida Board of Medicine to restrict transition-related care for transgender minors, a letter obtained by NBC News read.
The federal government is trying to fight such restrictions. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services recently proposed a rule that prohibits discrimination on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, and disability in certain health programs and activities.
Health experts and activists applauded the move, as it includes protections for LGBTQ identities.
“What we’re seeing happening in the states right now is an attempt to codify discriminatory attitudes towards LGBTQ people, particularly transgender people, in state law,” Kellan Baker, the executive director of the LGBTQ health advocacy group Whitman-Walker Institute, told ABC News.
“There’s nothing unusual about health care for transgender people. They all came from procedures, interventions, medications, and services that had been provided to cisgender people for a long time,” he added.
Research has shown that gender-affirming care can be life-saving for transgender people, and will improve the physical and mental health of those who receive it.
These ongoing battles come amid a growing list of instances in which DeSantis continues to spark debate against LGBTQ identities. Just a few weeks earlier, the Parental Rights in Education law, dubbed the “Don’t Say Gay” law, went into effect.
It bans classroom instruction on “sexual orientation or gender identity may not occur in kindergarten through grade 3 or in a manner that is not age-appropriate or developmentally appropriate for students in accordance with state standards,” according to the law’s language.
DeSantis and supporters of the law say it will give families more input in what their children are learning in schools and that children should not be learning about gender identity and sexual orientation at a young age.
Critics of the law said they believe it would set back the progress made by the LGBTQ community in the last few decades, and make children feel as though LGBTQ identities should be silenced or not spoken about. They say topics involving gender identity and sexual orientation are not inherently sexual, inappropriate or shameful.
More than 6 in 10 Americans oppose legislation that would prohibit classroom lessons about sexual orientation or gender identity in elementary school, a recent ABC News/Ipsos poll found.
Instances of vandalism and threats against gay bars, drag shows and drag queen story hours continue to be reported, with activists blaming anti-LGBTQ legislation and political rhetoric.
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(WASHINGTON) — Democratic Rep. Dean Phillips, D-Minn, said publicly that he would not support President Joe Biden in 2024 amid a slew of new polling reflecting Democrats’ desire for a new presidential candidate.
The White House on Friday dodged probing by ABC News’ Molly Nagle into what the administration thought about the House Democrat’s comments.
“Look, I’m going to stay where I am,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told ABC News. “The President intends to run in 2024. We are ways away from 2024. We are going to continue to focus on doing the business of the American people by delivering for families by lowering costs for families.”
Phillips on Friday called for a “new generation” of leadership on Friday in the White House in an interview on the Twin Cities-based radio show WCCO-AM.
“I think the country would be well-served by a new generation of compelling, well-prepared, dynamic Democrats who step up,” Phillips said.
“I think it’s time for a generational change,” said Phillips, who told host Chad Hartman he expects more Democrats to start speaking out about their concerns. “And I think most of my colleagues agree with that.”
President Biden is experiencing heightened levels of doubt from inside his own party, with a New York Times/Siena College poll earlier this month showing 64% of Democratic voters saying they would prefer a new standard-bearer for a White House bid in 2024. His job-approval rating remains at 33%, according to the same poll.
“I have respect for Joe Biden, I think he has — despite some mistakes and some missteps, despite his age — I think he’s a man of decency, of good principle, of compassion, of empathy and of strength,” Phillips added.
Biden and other White House officials have attempted to defend his electability in recent weeks, however.
Biden fired back in early July at ABC News reporter Ben Gittleson, who asked about Democrats who’d prefer he didn’t run again.
“Read the poll,” Biden said, referring to the NYT/Siena College poll. “92% said if I did [run again], they’d vote for me.”
Jean-Pierre also cited the 92% figure when asked to react to the poll– which, administration supporters were also quick to note, did show him winning a hypothetical rematch with former President Donald Trump.
“You know, there’s going to be many polls,” she said. “They are going to go up and they are going to go down. This is not the thing that we are solely focused on.”
Polling data also shows that a majority of Americans would not prefer the former president seek another White House term either.
Trump has teased, but has not officially confirmed a plan to run for another White House term, while Biden has said multiple times that he will seek reelection.
“When you have such a sour, negative political environment, voters in general are looking for change,” GOP pollster Robert Blizzard told ABC News earlier this week. “They’re looking for new voices, new people.”
-ABC News’ Ben Siegel contributed to this report.
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(WASHINGTON) — House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., on Friday said he did not “recall” speaking to former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson on Jan. 6 after the former White House official testified about their conversation under oath to the Jan. 6 select committee.
Last month, Hutchinson, a former top aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows who was in the West Wing on Jan. 6, testified that McCarthy called her angrily on Jan. 6 after former President Donald Trump told his supporters in a speech to march to the U.S. Capitol.
“He then explained the President just said he’s marching to the Capitol. ‘You told me this whole week you aren’t coming up here. Why would you lie to me?’ I said, ‘I wasn’t lying to you, sir. We’re not going to the Capitol,'” Hutchinson said in her testimony.
She also said McCarthy texted her, “Do you guys think you are coming to my office?”
McCarthy, who has rebuffed the committee’s subpoena for his records and sworn testimony regarding the Capitol riot, said he didn’t remember talking to Hutchinson, and only called White House aides to “find the president.”
“I don’t recall talking to her that day. I recall talking to [Trump aide] Dan Scavino, I recall talking to Jared [Kushner], I recall talking to Trump,” he said Friday.
“If I talked to her, I don’t remember it. If it was coming up here, I don’t think I wanted a lot of people coming up to the Capitol. But I don’t remember the conversation.”
McCarthy said “I don’t remember” being concerned about Trump’s comments at his Jan. 6 rally because he “didn’t watch the speech.”
“I was working, so I didn’t see what was said, I didn’t see what went on until after the fact,” he added.
McCarthy has previously said he spoke to Trump on Jan. 6 and encouraged him to get his supporters out of the Capitol.
He later said Trump “bears responsibility” for the Capitol riot, but quickly moved to mend his relationship with Trump, opposing his second impeachment and visiting with him at his Palm Beach, Florida, club.
In leaked audio of GOP leadership calls first reported by the New York Times, McCarthy suggested to colleagues he would encourage Trump to resign and said, “I’ve had it with this guy.” Asked later about the remarks, McCarthy told reporters he spoke hypothetically.
McCarthy also opposed efforts to set up an independent outside commission to investigate the Capitol attack, after initially deputizing a top Republican to negotiate a bipartisan agreement with Democrats.
Asked Friday about Trump potentially announcing a 2024 election bid ahead of the congressional midterms, McCarthy replied, “The only thing the president and I have talked about is winning in 2022.”
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(WASHINGTON) — House Democrats will vote Friday on a bill to ban assault weapons in the U.S.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., announced the vote in a letter to colleagues on Friday morning, calling the legislation “a crucial step in our ongoing fight against the deadly epidemic of gun violence in our nation.”
Pelosi urged colleagues to vote for same-day authority — a procedural hurdle that requires a separate vote — in order to fast-track the bill Friday afternoon.
The bill comes roughly two decades after Congress allowed such restrictions to lapse.
“I’m excited today because for a long time now I had wanted to reinstate the assault weapons ban,” Pelosi said in her weekly press conference ahead of the vote. “You weren’t here, maybe weren’t even born when we did this in the 90s. It was hard but it happened, and it saved lives. And I’m looking forward to having a good passage of it this afternoon.”
President Joe Biden and gun control advocates renewed calls to outlaw weapons like AR-15 rifles in the wake of recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York; Uvalde, Texas and Highland Park, Illinois.
Highland Park Mayor Nancy Rotering pleaded with lawmakers just last week to ban such weapons, stating she will be “haunted forever” after a shooter opened fire during the city’s Fourth of July parade, killing seven people.
Congress passed its first major piece of gun reform in 30 years in June, which enhanced background checks for potential gun buyers under the age of 21 and included money for red flag laws and mental health services. But the measure fell short of what Biden and Democrats hoped to enact.
Leading gun manufacturing executives who testified before lawmakers on Wednesday maintained that people, not firearms, cause mass shootings.
“I hope the American people are paying attention today. It is clear that gun-makers are not going to change unless Congress forces them to finally put people over profits,” Rep. Carolyn Maloney, the chair of the House Oversight Committee, said during the hearing.
House Democrats originally planned on including a ban on assault weapons in a broader public safety package, but division within the caucus has delayed leadership’s efforts to bring the package to the floor before the August recess.
Pelosi said Friday that work continues on the other policing measures, including legislation to create new federal grant programs for local police departments.
“House Democrats are committed to building safer communities, in every corner of the country,” she wrote. “To that end, our Members have been working on a robust package of public safety bills and have made immense progress in our discussions.”
While the assault weapons ban may clear the House, such legislation is not likely to advance in the Senate, where Democrats would need at least 10 Republican votes to overcome the filibuster.
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(WASHINGTON) — Despite Wednesday’s news of a potential billion-dollar Senate climate deal, environmental activists still appeared at Thursday night’s annual Congressional Baseball Game in the hope that President Joe Biden and congressional Democrats will follow through on their climate promises, though at a much smaller scale than anticipated.
U.S. Capitol Police and Washington’s Metropolitan Police Department said earlier this week that they were aware of potentially hundreds of protesters and would have an increased presence in the area of Nationals Park, where the century-old charity event is taking place.
The climate activists want Democrats to immediately pass the newly announced energy investments — brokered, per a late Wednesday announcement, between West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin and Majority Leader Chuck Schumer as part of another spending bill via reconciliation — and for Biden to declare a climate emergency.
The protest was planned as anger mounted against Manchin, one of the most conservative Democrats in the 50-50 Senate who earlier this month seemingly closed the door on climate negotiations in the next spending package, saying he could not support the environmental provisions of Democrats’ bill because of historic inflation.
“Hopeful that both actions can be taken swiftly, activists will continue pushing until Democrats’ climate promises are signed, sealed, and delivered,” Now Or Never, the group of climate organizations organizing Thursday’s protest, said in a statement.
A spokesperson for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, a Now Or Never member, said the group was “very surprised” at the successful climate negotiations.
“We didn’t anticipate that announcement to happen at that hour,” Quentin Scott told ABC News. “We’re very encouraged by what the Senate and President Biden announced last night, and we support those negotiations. And so far, the text looks pretty solid, but not perfect.”
Scott and Chesapeake Climate Action Network decided a few hours before the baseball game that they would not be protesting. Another Now Or Never spokesperson said the demonstration would be “significantly different” after the announcement of climate provisions advancing in the spending bill.
On Wednesday, more than 300 people had registered to attend the protest. Upwards of 75 were seen gathered after the start of the game.
“We have decided not to protest tonight’s Congressional Baseball Game. Congressional leaders have declared they intend to meet many of our climate and justice demands, so we’ll be attending the game tonight just to urge Congress to seal the deal and to ask Joe Biden to still declare a climate emergency,” Chesapeake Climate Action Network Director Mike Tidwell said in a statement.
If passed, the Manchin and Schumer agreement, known as the Inflation Reduction Act, would be perhaps the largest clean energy package in U.S. history. Senate Democrats hope to approve it before the August recess begins next week — a daunting time-crunch, given other pressures.
The climate bill, which also includes major health care and corporate tax provisions, would spend about $370 billion for climate and energy programs over the next 10 years, such as using tax credits to incentivize consumers to buy electric cars, fund the domestic manufacturing of batteries and solar panels and allocate spending for other environmental initiatives.
“We’re really happy with this $60 billion in environmental justice priorities. We’re really happy with the $9 billion … rebates for homes. And we’re also very happy with the tax credits for used and new electric vehicles,” said Scott, the Chesapeake Climate Action Network spokesperson. “But,” he added, “we also recognize the things that are not perfect about the deal, we’re going to continue to fight.”
Thursday’s event organizers had warned that if Congress did not act on climate legislation by Sept. 30, they were planning a separate, “highly disruptive, mass direct action that fundamentally disrupts business-as-usual in D.C.”
“If Congress passes the deal that they announced yesterday, then it’s very unlikely that we will go ahead with a future action. But we also reserve the right to come back if somehow this deal falls apart and actually carry through those escalated actions,” Scott told ABC news.
District police said in a statement they were aware of potential protests and would have an increased presence in the area “to ensure the safety and security of the event.”
U.S. Capitol Police Chief Tom Manger wrote on Twitter on Wednesday that his officers had a “robust security plan in place” for the game.
“We are aware that demonstrators are planning to protest political issues at the Congressional Baseball Game for Charity. Our mission is to protect the Members of Congress during this family event, so we have a robust security plan in place,” Manger wrote.
“We urge anyone who is thinking about causing trouble at the charity game to stay home,” he wrote. “We will not tolerate violence or any unlawful behavior during this family event.”
Thursday’s demonstration also comes after the arrest of six congressional staff members for sitting in the office of Senate Majority Leader Schumer, urging him to keep negotiating on the climate provisions that were later revived with Manchin.
“Our first demand was to reopen climate negotiations which were considered dead for July — and they did!” he said. “So it is a big big win, now we need to fight to improve the policy and fight to pass it.”
The Congressional Baseball Game is a bipartisan tradition dating back to 1909, with proceeds supporting D.C.-area charities. The annual game has been under threat before. In 2017, at a practice for Republican lawmakers, then-House Majority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., and Capitol Police officer Crystal Griner were shot.
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(WASHINGTON) — Supreme Court Justice Samuel Alito for the first time publicly addressed critics of his landmark opinion overturning Roe v. Wade, using a speech in Italy to make light of Britain’s Prince Harry and other foreign figures who have lamented the rollback of U.S. protections for abortion.
“What really wounded me, what really wounded me, was when the Duke of Sussex addressed the United Nations and seemed to compare the decision — whose name may not be spoken — with the Russian attack on Ukraine,” Alito said in a sarcastic tone. The decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health, was released last month.
Prince Harry had referenced “the rolling back of constitutional rights here in the U.S.” as well as war in Ukraine as examples of why 2022 is “a painful year in a painful decade,” during a speech July 18 in New York.
Alito also made light of commentary from outgoing British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, French President Emmanuel Macron and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau.
“I had the honor this term of writing I think the only Supreme Court decision in the history of that institution that has been lambasted by a whole string of foreign leaders who felt perfectly fine commenting on American law,” he said. “One of these was former Prime Minister Boris Johnson, but he paid the price.”
Alito appeared to reference Johnson’s recent resignation after a series of scandals in office.
The justice’s comments came during a speech July 21 in Rome at a conference on religious liberty hosted by the University of Notre Dame Law School. The appearance was not previously announced by the Court; video of the speech was posted online Thursday.
“It is hard to convince people that religious liberty is worth defending if they don’t think that religion is a good thing that deserves protection,” Alito told the audience. “The challenge for those who want to protect religious liberty in the United States, Europe, and other similar places is to convince people who are not religious that religious liberty is worth special protection. That will not be easy to do.”
The Court’s conservative majority delivered significant victories for religious liberty in the most recent term, affirming the right of a public school football coach to pray among students at the 50-yard line; allow a civic group to raise a Christian flag on Boston City Hall flag pole; and permit Maine families to utilize taxpayer-funded tuition credits for religious schools.
Those decisions, along with major rulings on gun rights, climate policy and immigration, thrust the justices to the center of a divisive and highly-partisan public debate.
Justice Sonia Sotomayor, the most senior liberal and third woman justice, and Justice Amy Coney Barrett, the most junior conservative and 5th woman justice, held a rare public conversation Thursday night in what appeared to be at least partly a bid toward lowering the temperature of debate.
“We like each other. We really do,” Barrett said of her relationship with Sotomayor and her other colleagues. “As is often joked, this is like a marriage. We have life tenure and we get along.”
“Fundamentally, they are good people,” Sotomayor said of her colleagues.
The pair, appearing together for the first time, spoke as part of the Reagan Institute’s Summit on Education in a session moderated by Yale Law professor Akhil Reed Amar. The theme of the event was “An Educated Citizenry.”
“To the extent we can maintain a tone,” Barrett said, “I think that in itself has an educative function on civics.”
Neither addressed any of the decisions of the past term, even obliquely; but they did lament public misunderstanding of the court and demonization of its members.
“For me, democracy means an informed group of people,” Sotomayor said, “because without being informed, you really can’t know how to shape, how to live with others.”
Organizers of the event said the conversation was pre-taped several weeks ago but aired Thursday for the first time.
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(WASHINGTON) — Secret Service Director Jim Murray is extending his time with the agency until a new director is selected, briefly extending his tenure as his agents finds themselves in the middle of renewed controversy over their actions related to last year’s Capitol riot.
Murray told his colleagues of his extension in an internal note reviewed by ABC News.
“As you are aware, our new director has not yet been named, however, I can tell you that the selection process is active and ongoing,” Murray wrote. “In light of these circumstances I’ve decided to briefly delay my retirement and transition to the private sector in order to help bridge the gap and foster a smooth and meaningful transition for our future Director.”
Murray wrote in his note that he spoke with Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas and White House leadership and they agreed to extend his July 30 retirement date.
The Secret Service has come under new scrutiny over its handing of text messages from the days before, during and after Jan. 6.
Those messages, which the agency maintains were deleted during a software update for its phones, were supposed to be preserved and turned over as part of investigations into the Capitol attack.
The Department of Homeland Security inspector general, an internal watchdog who had sought the records before they were deleted, recently launched a criminal probe into what happened, according to three sources familiar with the situation.
A secret service spokesperson told ABC News that the texts were not maliciously deleted, and Director Murray said in a statement last week that he was reaffirming his commitment to working with and helping the House Jan. 6 committee.
“As an American and Director of this incredible agency, I found the events at the Capitol on January 6th to be abhorrent. What happened on that day in January 2021 is anathema to democracy and the processes our constitution guarantees,” he said then. “Since day one, I have directed our personnel to cooperate fully and completely with the Committee and we are currently finalizing dates and times for our personnel to make themselves available to the Committee for follow up inquiries.”
“We have provided thousands of documents, operationally sensitive radio transmissions and access to Secret Service employees,” he said. “We will continue to cooperate fully with the Committee and any other investigative body and remain committed to helping ensure that another such lawless and violent assault on our Constitutional process never takes place again.”
Still, members of the House panel have been skeptical of the Secret Service’s explanations.
“I don’t really buy that for one minute,” Rep. Jamie Raskin, R-Md., said on “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” this week. “For one thing, isn’t it a little odd that all of the texts would vanish for Jan. 6th and Jan. 5th? Of all the days, what an odd coincidence that is.”
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(WASHINGTON) — Another major legislative win for Democrats came Thursday, when — over Republican objections of “corporate welfare” — a bipartisan group in the House passed a bill that funds the nation’s science and technology industries with billions to boost domestic production of crucial semiconductor chips and additional research and development.
The bill cleared the chamber in a 243-187 vote (with one “present” vote) despite late-hour pushes from GOP leadership against the legislation. Twenty-four Republicans joined Democrats in backing the measure, which now heads to the White House for President Joe Biden’s signature.
One lawmaker, Rep. Sara Jacobs, D-Calif., whose grandfather Irwin Jacobs founded semiconductor manufacturer Qualcomm, voted “present.”
“If you want to know who hates this bill, who lobbies against it — the Chinese Communist Party. Why? Because they know it’ll help us compete against them,” Rep. Mike McCaul of Texas, the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee and a major advocate of the package, told reporters while criticizing fellow Republicans for opposing the bill.
Rep. Frank Dean Lucas of Oklahoma, the ranking GOP member on the House Science, Space and Technology Committee, took another view.
“Regrettably, and it’s more regrettably than you can possibly image, I will not be casting my vote for [the chips bill],” he said. “This is one of those occasions that as a statesman and responsible member of Congress, I have to put aside my own pride in science committee’s work and cast the vote that represents the best interest of Americans and, particularly, the good people of the third district of Oklahoma.”
Supporters of the $280 billion proposal highlight the roughly $52 billion it provides to incentivize the creation of semiconductor facilities and therefore increase the competitiveness of the industry in the U.S. at a time when countries like China dominate the sphere.
There’s a significant shortage of these chips, which serve as the “brain” of all kinds of technology in the U.S., from phones to appliances and cars and much more.
Many House Republicans supported the bill as recently as Wednesday, before the surprise news of a deal struck between Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., and Senate Majority Leader Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., on an expansive spending bill focused on Democratic priorities like climate, health care and corporate taxes.
Manchin had previously said he would not support climate and tax policies in the pending spending package, citing inflation. But Wednesday’s agreement, he said, would actually reduce the government deficit by hundreds of billions of dollars.
Republicans were not pleased. Some had backed the microchip bill once they believed Manchin’s objections had killed Democrats’ spending plans. On Wednesday, shortly before Manchin publicly changed course, the Senate passed the chip bill 64-33 after more than a year of gridlock.
Club for Growth, a Washington-based economic organization, has maintained opposition to the bill — and called on House Republicans to vote no in light of the spending agreement between Manchin and Schumer, which Senate Democrats hope to approve before the August recess.
“The House GOP should kill CHIPS now that 17 Senate GOPers got played by Schumer & Manchin on reconciliation,” Club for Growth Vice President Scott T. Parkinson wrote on Twitter on Wednesday.
“I was a no last week, I was a no last night, and I’ll be the first no on the board today,” House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., said on the floor Thursday, calling the measure “corporate welfare.”
The bill is also a top national security policy for the White House, with Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, while briefing lawmakers earlier this month, calling its passage a “matter of urgency” and saying the country was “out of time” to act.
Biden issued a statement on the legislation shortly after it cleared the House, saying he “looks forward to signing this bill into law.”
“The CHIPS and Science Act is exactly what we need to be doing to grow our economy right now. By making more semiconductors in the United States, this bill will increase domestic manufacturing and lower costs for families. And, it will strengthen our national security by making us less dependent on foreign sources of semiconductors,” he said.
ABC News’ Molly Nagle contributed to this report.
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(WASHINGTON) — The Senate confirmed Steven Dettelbach as director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives earlier this month, making him only the second ATF director to win Senate approval since confirmation was required in 2006.
Dettelbach, who is a former federal prosecutor and U.S. attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, was sworn in July 19 to run ATF, the law enforcement agency in charge of enforcing the nation’s gun and explosives laws.
He sat down with “GMA3” to discuss his plans for the agency, the powers the agency has at its disposal and his thoughts on the country’s gun violence epidemic.
GMA3: Sir, thank you for being here. First time in seven years. They’ve had acting directors, but not a permanent director. Has that impacted the agency and its work in some way by not having a permanent person in place?
DETTELBACH: Well, first of all, thanks for having me. And look, there are incredible people out there all across the country, ATF folks who have been working really hard to try and combat violent crime, gun crime for all these years. And I think from my standpoint, as you say that the first Senate-confirmed director in seven years, I feel a lot of obligation. To do it is to stand up and fight for those folks.
They’re doing a great job and I am there to support and try and make sure that our state and local partners have what they need. Because you said it right, there is a big problem out there. Mass shootings are a big problem. But in addition, there’s that constant drumbeat of tragedy that goes on because of violent crime and gun violence.
GMA3: And you mentioned it because, again, the very high profile awful tragedies in these mass shootings we’ve been seeing, oftentimes we hear the ATF has helped track down the weapons or doing something with shell casings, you know, that type of forensic work. But what are you doing? Help people understand what the ATF does to prevent gun violence in this country. Maybe there’s not mass shootings, but the everyday gun violence.
DETTELBACH: Yeah, absolutely. So you’re right, there’s different parts of this and there’s some things that are newer that the public doesn’t know about; then there’s the tried-and-true things that are really important, start with that.
So I’m in New York today to sit down and meet with New York law enforcement because they are some of the leaders in the country in terms of being smart about combating gun violence and having task forces to make sure that we’re working together. The days of “this is my turf, that’s your turf” are over in law enforcement. We work together.
So that task force, that’s the new thing that you talked about, is what we call crime gun intelligence. And that can be used both to try and catch shooters and take them off the street and also to catch them before they kill again. So, as you said, to prevent.
So one of the things that we do is do what’s called a trace and that’s available free to every law enforcement. That’s like getting the birth certificate of a firearm where it started. Then I think you pointed out this thing is called NIBIN but it really is the part that comes out the back of the firearm, the injected cartridge casing. There’s now science that allows us to find out because bad guys don’t usually pick that up, right?
What we find, we can now connect that shooting to maybe some shooting that happened last week or the week before. And that really is a hot lead for law enforcement to go out and get that person before they act again.
GMA3: How do we– because so much of the gun violence we see and again, the high-profile cases are one thing, but then we see what happens in places like Chicago, here in New York [there] was a violent weekend and so many people got shot– how do you prevent that gun violence? How do you get those guns off the streets? Because that’s the violence that doesn’t always make the headlines.
DETTELBACH: Yeah, my background before I did this job, for 20 years I was a federal prosecutor and then I was a U.S. attorney. And so I will tell you that law enforcement alone cannot do this. It has to be a wholesome approach. I always compare it to a three-legged stool. You have to have great enforcement, right? Because people need to know there are dangerous people in this community that need to be caught and they need to be, we need to be protected from.
You also have to work with the entire community to do prevention work. That means giving families and kids options before they get inculcated into this violent culture that we have out there. And then the third part is reentry. So it’s the No. 1 predictor in many cases of whether you’re going to do something violent and be a criminal is whether you have done it before. We need to do a better job of making sure people aren’t recidivists. Those three things, it’s a three-legged stool because if you don’t do any one right, the stool falls.
GMA3: Director, how are you doing? Because all that sounds really hefty, it sounds like a big project. How do you do that with such– you’re the smallest division of the Justice Department, 2,500 agents. I believe D.C. has more police officers, I think by a thousand, than you do agents. You’re supposed to be doing this all over the country. Why do you have so few?
DETTELBACH: Well, look, if you ask any police chief or executive in the country, they could use [more]. And the president, by the way, has proposed a significant increase to ATF’s budget for this year. But as you said, my job, I’m in law enforcement, is to do the best with what we have now. And the way we do that is partnership, it’s with working with state and local law enforcement to be a force multiplier.
Back when I started this business as a prosecutor, you know, 30 years ago, there were eight different agencies doing the same thing in their own little task forces, in their own little units. We cannot do that anymore. We have to share intelligence and share bodies in real-time ways.
And that stuff is happening in New York. That’s why I mean, what’s happening right here in New York is actually in many ways a national model. And not everybody can do what they do in New York because crime looks different in different places. But they are doing stuff with task forces, they are doing stuff with crime gun intelligence, and we are their full partners in doing that and we have to support that.
GMA3: Let’s get your take on one last thing here, because we see the mass shootings and we often see that the shooter did buy a firearm legally, but for the most part, the violence we’re seeing day in, day out, on streets, is the problem illegally possessed guns more so than legally bought guns? How big is that issue?
DETTELBACH: It’s a huge issue. There are people that have firearms that the law clearly says, and I think almost everybody agrees, should not have firearms. So those are people who are, let’s say, convicted murderers, rapists, you know, felons, other groups of people who are laid out in law. And they are able to get firearms far too easily, and they’re using them to hurt people. A lot of people.
Not in cases that make the national news, just like you said, T.J., but in everyday tragedies that are playing out in this country and God bless the police and and federal agents who are working together to work on this because it is a 24-hour a day, seven-day a week problem, and it can get very, very hard on them and dangerous for them. So one thing I want to say is, you know, we owe them a lot.
GMA3: And we get it. From your perspective, you’re not the policy guy, you’re the enforcement guy. But our problem is not legal gun owners in this country. Would you say it’s not legally purchased guns?
DETTELBACH: Look, I am not the policy guy. I am the enforcement guy. Congress just came together in a bipartisan way to give us more tools to try and deal with this problem. I’ll use whatever– that debate is important, but my job is to take what comes out of Congress, the laws on the books, and make sure we’re doing everything we can to protect people.
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