David Codrea Exclusive: "Chief Counsel’s Office still calling shots at ATF despite report, source alleges." B. Todd Jones -- just another sock puppet (in a long line of sock puppets) for the anti-gun Chief Counsel's Office.

B. Todd Jones -- just another sock puppet (in a long line of sock puppets) for the anti-gun Chief Counsel's Office.

"Crediting Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives Deputy Director Thomas E. Brandon for a problems analysis summary is not justified, an insider source told Gun Rights Examiner yesterday. The 'Quick Hits' report admitting to retaliation and ethical violations by the Chief Counsel’s Office was the result of a Field Agent Advisory Panel, and Brandon’s role was not to direct or participate in the document’s development, but simply to receive it after it had been prepared."

“The question should be, ‘what has he done with it since he got it?’” the source continued. “To my knowledge, not much of anything.”

Adding to concerns over inappropriate and problematic influence by the Chief Counsel’s Office over day-to-day operations and management decisions, another allegation corroborates concerns that nothing is or will be changed under the caretaker stewardship on behalf of the Holder Justice Department by Acting Director B. Todd Jones.

“After the issues detailed by the FAAP were first posted on the intranet homepage - they were quickly taken down by order of the Chief Counsel's Office,” the source maintained, citing retaliations that have occurred since Brandon was presented with that document.

“DOJ runs ATF through B. Todd and don't mistake for a second that Brandon is second-in-command,” the source continued. “He answers to Greg Serres [Deputy Chief Counsel] who is always at BTJ's side.

“Don't give agents and people hope where there is none,” the source cautioned. “Management has heard all those ‘Quick Hits’ before. They didn't do anything about it then and haven't this time around either.”

Whether Darrell Issa and the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform will investigate the report’s observations of undue influence and ethical violations, whether they will raise this as an important issue with the Inspector General and whether it will figure prominently in the long-anticipated OIG report on Operation Fast and Furious, and whether they will do anything to introduce new hope and bring the Chief Counsel’s Office to account remain to be seen.

So it would seem that B. Todd Jones is just another sock puppet (in a long line of sock puppets) for the anti-gun Chief Counsel's Office. And Tom Brandon, whatever his inclinations are, is just another ATF bureaucrat unwilling to do the right thing if it jeopardizes his pension.