as i understand it, what he was asking for. he understood well that the investigation was going to go on. we have a lot to investigate, but he talked about the contempt and that was my understanding to the gentle lady. >> you can see, mr. chairman, finally, that there is a dispute even on what went on in the room and i think it merits continuing discussions with the justice department. if the gentle lady would urth iffer yield, i trust that the did you want is hearing my -- if they'd like to deliver documents they can. >> but, of course, if a contempt is voted already then, of course, we have ended that possibility. and since the justice department is now hearing a difference

between two people who were at the same meeting and it does seem to me that it calls for some -- some opportunity for the justice department to come forward and resolve that dispute between the two figures who were in the deliberations and i would ask that that be considered. >> i appreciate the gentle lady if she would yield. >> i would be glad to yield. i want to go back to something you said. in the -- in the document which was sent from the attorney general's office is now part of the record and i just want to read the last few words that says, in closing, while we are deeply disappointed, the committee attempts to move forward, i stress that the department remains willing to work toward a mutually satisfactory resolution to this matter, please do not hesitate to contact us. thanks very much for yielding.

>> the young lady's time has expired. >> the gentleman from utah seek recognition. >> the gentleman is recognized. >> thank you, mr. chairman. >> the beauty and miracle that is the united states of america is that there is no one person in this country that's above the law, and i believe that this committee has a duty and obligation, and a right to investigate this matter to its fullest effect. in fact, i harken back to the words of obama on his first full days of office. let me say simply as i can, transparency in the laws will be the touchstone of this presidency and i will hold as president to a new standard of openness, but the mere fact that you have the legal power to give something secret does not mean you should always use it. the freedom of information act is perhaps the most powerful treatment we have in making our government honest and transparent in holding it accountable and expect members of my administration, not simply to live up to the letter, but also the spirit of the law.

the president then issued a memorandum to the heads of the executive departments on january 1, 2009, quote, the president should not keep information confidential simply because errors or farrells might be revealed or speculative or abtract fears, end quote. the president then in march of 2011, in talking about fast and furious said there would be a situation here in which a serious mistake was made and if that's the case we'll find out and hold somebody accountable. ladies and gentlemen, that has not happened. on february 4, last year, 2011, the congress was sent a letter that was false. it took ten months for that information to be provided to be withdrawn. the subpoena that we're talking about today was issued in october of last year, and now it's june 20th and the president is issuing, is exerting executive privilege and we haven't yet seen this? i'd like it enter into the record, i'd ask unanimous

consent to enter a letter of june 3, 2011 signed by 31 democrats sent to the president of the united states. >> without objection. a couple of excerpts from this letter, quote, it is equally troubling that the department of justice has delayed action and withheld information from congressional inquiries, end quote. later it said a letter from 31 democrats to the president june 3, 2011, quote, while the department of justice can and should continue its investigation, those activities should not curtail the ability of congress to fulfill its oversight duties, end quote. we urge you to instruct the department of justice to promptly provide complete answers on this issue, end quote. none of that has happened. it's sad. it's disappointing. it shouldn't have come to this. nobody likes doing this. this is not about eric holder. it is about the department of justice and justice in the united states of america. have the guts, i hope we have

the guts and the perseverance to get to the bottom of this. we have nearly 2,000 weapons purposely -- purposely given to drug cartels. we have hundreds of dead people in mexico. we have a dead united states border patrol agent and we have a government that's withholding information so that we can not only get to the bottom of it, but that we can fix it and make sure it never, ever happens again, and when we're issued a letter and ten months later they have to pull it back and say that's not true, something is fundamentally wrong. it's also not about 140,000 documents that the department of justice knowingly says that they have and we have less than 8,000 of them. it's not about those numbers, it's the fact that we don't have all of them, whatever that number is. and when you have somebody like the former acting director of the atf say under oath, quote, it was very frustrating to all of us and it appears thoroughly to us that the department is really trying to figure out a way to push the information away

from their political appointees to the department, he was talking about the department of justice and those are things we should be concerned about and nobody wants to put a conclusion more than chairman issa, i want a conclusion to this. everyone on the panel wants a conclusion to this. when this problem came up to the gsa they dealt with them. martha johnson stepped down and when we had problems, within days people resigned and stepped down. but the reality is we have not gotten to the problem of this and brian terry was killed in december 2010, we have a duty and obligation, a moral obligation to get to the bottom of this. it's sad and disappointing, but the department of justice should provide us these documents. it's disappointing that we have to be here today. it's not about eric holder, it's about the department of justice and justice in the you said united states of america and that's why i urge to show the guts needed to pass this and

move it to the floor for further debate. thank you, mr. chairman. i yield back. >> i thank the gentleman for yielding back. i recognize the gentleman from new york, mr. towns. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. i'm troubled over how we're going about this. as a former chairman of this committee i am deeply disturbed that this committee is continuing to pursue the unprecedented course of holding a sitting attorney general in contempt of congress. mr. chairman, you claim that contempt is warranted because mr. holder's office has refused to turn over documents that the majority asserts is critical to the investigation of gun walking, operation along the arizona-mexico border. the majority claims are without merit.

and let me say it was a situation where the attorney general has not responding, but he's been up here nine times testifying and let me just say one other thing, too, that in all of my 30 years of being in the united states congress, the way that he was treated when he was here testifying before this committee, i must admit i've never seen anybody treated in that fashion. so i don't understand why we have to move in this order if they're cooperating, if they're not cooperating then maybe we can understand what you're doing, but i'll be honest with you. i think this is a mistake, a major mistake, and i really want you to know that i think this should be discontinued and let's see if we can continue -- >> part of today's meeting of the house the oversight committee continuing to contempt

citation against attorney general and we can see it on c-span.org and the committee gaveling back in shortly, 40 members on the committee and 23 republican and 17 democrats and the vote is ahead. live coverage here on c-span3. prior to our recess, the previous question was called. i now ask unanimous consent that we withdraw the previous question and without objection, so ordered. does any member seek recognition to offer an amendment? the gentleman, for what reason does the gentleman from vermont rise? >> the amendment to the report

offered by mr. welch of vermont. >> the gentleman's recognized to explain his amendment. >> thank you very much, mr. chairman. my amendment which has -- has it been distributed? you want me to wait? you can do it and explain it as it's being distributed. the thrust of my amendment, mr. chairman goes to points that i was making earlier about the -- from my perspective, limited scope of the investigation that the committee has done that doesn't include as comprehensive an approach to what happened in the predecessor of gun walking and gunrunning operations with the bush administration with the mukasey administration and the justice department, and what this does is call on on the

committee to postpone action on the contempt until that investigation is done. it would add language to the report that explains that proceeding to contempt at this time in my view as expressed in this amendment is unwarranted because we have not as a committee done the investigation that needs to be done in order to establish a credible basis for the committee to take what will be historic action in contempt to the sitting united states attorney general and i say that as a member of the committee who is a strong supporter of the efforts of the committee including when it's led by a republican chair to get to the bottom of issues that affect the public interest and as a strong supporter of the use of the subpoena power of this committee whether it's being presented by a republican or

democrat to get access to all of the information that we have, but on the other hand, i do think the committee has a responsibility to do as thorough an investigation as a predicate to asking for the contempt citation, and that's number one. number two, somehow, some way, a lot of people in this committee are trying to do this, by the way, i thought that many of the remarks of my colleagues were compelling and if there was a chance to get to the bipartisan approval of the unprecedented action it will give some peace of mind, i think, to the american public that this is us in pursuit of our duty and it will limit some of the questions about whether it's a partisan motivation. so i think this is appropriate. i would much -- it is much more secure and i think a lot of us

and the origins of this operation and the previous administration and this point was made by the ranking member and mr. cummings issued a 95-page staff report that was based on a very thorough review of the evidence. that report, and that report was fast and furious and it was sent in a series of operations in five years that was run by the atf field office in phoenix. so this was not something that is new. there's a lot of questions about how much high officials at the doj knew about it, but it had been going on before this for at least five years, and the committee has obtained documents showing that in 2007, and mr. chairman, and i appreciate the urgency that this committee has, under your leadership to try to get to access to all of the

information that it feels it needs, but what i also believe is that the committee should be doing as much of a comprehensive investigation that goes back to both administrations to get to the bottom of this, to get to the truth which is the common goal we share, number two, we should do this in a way that establishes the absolute foundation of credibility before we ask this congress to take an action that will be for the first time in the history of this country that we ask congress to hold the sitting attorney, the united states attorney general in contempt. i know there's a dispute also as to how cooperative the attorney general is and not very, but in the record of eight different appearances before congress, and the production of thousands of pages of documents and e-mails. that's not a defense not providing everything that we can

legitimately ask, but it's a relevant factor in terms of whether or not there's an ability to get to an agreement the final point is that you raised a point about privilege log and there will be withholding of documents that are titled to a log. i agree with that. but so much has happened since last friday where the nature of the subpoena has significantly changed that i do have a question as to do we really have to do this now or does it make sense to take a little bit more time to work this out in a way that meets the committee requirements, but stops short of what is going to be an unprecedented action. >> would the gentleman yield? >> i would yield, thank you, mr. chairman. >> i might add that we restricted to less items on the subpoena so any time you have to answer less there's nothing new to decide. we limited it down to just one

item so i would hope everyone would understand we didn't change what we were asking for. we narrowed it to what was considered for contempt and i will make one pledge to you, mr. wells, regardless of your amendment, regardless of the contempt vote, i am not done looking at justice and i'm sure that mr. grassley is not done looking at justice and alcohol, tobacco and fire for the serious reorganization that will be necessary to prevent this and other misconduct from occurring in the future. so you have my pledge regardless of what happens here today that we're not done with trying to get it right at atf. >> thank you. >> i yield back, mr. chairman. >> the gentleman of utah is recognized for five minutes. >> i thank you, mr. chairman. >> i rise an opposition. i have the greatest respect for the gentleman of vermont. i know he stands on principle and he's passionate about this country and wants truth and justice in all ways. i have the greatest respect for him, but i do stand in

opposition to this amendment. this has been going on for a long time, and i would also site the actual contempt items. we looked at the subpoena that was issued back in october. i would point to item number e one. i would also point to items number 2, number 4 and number 5, it was not just limited to just fast and furious, it says all communication relating to operation fast and furious, this is under point number one, the jacob chambers case or any organized crime, drug enforcement task force, firearms, trafficking case based in phoenix, arizona, to or from the following individuals. on number 2, it says the latter part of it says, referring to or relating to operation fast and furious or any other firearms trafficking case. point number 4, all documents and communications referring or relating to incidents prior to

february 4, 2011, with the bureau of tobacco, and firearms were illegally purchased and transferred again, not a limitation on fast and furious. number 5, all documents and occurrences related to february 4th, where weapons and subsequently became aware of those weapons entered mexico. as representative goudy pointed out in his testimony our concern here is about gun walking and the concern with the moving forward today and the contempt order today is to get the department of justice, the documents that it needs to get to truth and just toys make sure this never, ever happens again. the president said in march 2011, and i concur and a rot lo other members concur that we have to hold people accountable and make sure that we have the

changes necessary so that it never, ever happens again. now we -- so to say that we are going to put this off so we can get an attorney general michael mukasey is a different issue. it is a different issue. i am committed to work with you and others to get to the bottom of gun walking. it was wrong then, and i wasn't here, but it's wrong now. and the idea that the -- that this obama administration, the department of justice continued to propel it forward is just fundamentally wrong, and if the department of justice is right and they make the assertion that the senior levels of the department of justice were not involved and they didn't know about it and they didn't authorize it. i disagree with that assertion based on the documents we've seen and if that's the case why not hand us the documents and why is it that president obama is suddenly invoking executive privilege on documents that we were told yesterday that we would be glad to give us.

that doesn't really add up. there's something here that we need to know about. it should have been disposed of last year. we've been exceptionally patient and last year. chairman issa has been bent over backwards to be act come dating, but we still have a responsibility to followthrough on our responsibility, regardless of party to get to the bottom of this to make sure that this never happens again. >> will the gentleman yield? >> yes. >> did you just say that in the negotiations last night t attorney general indicated that they would provide the documents, so now you're asking why they would issue executive -- some of the documents. >> some of the documents. >> some of t the attorney general with an executive privilege claim when it realized the claim irrespective of the willingness to provide the documents.

>> reclaiming my time, that is not true, it's inaccurate, when we first start, we issued the subpoena it came to light that there were 70,000 documents out there that were being reviewed by the ig. we still haven't seen the ig's report. so this committee has been given less than 8,000 of what the attorney general said week before last are 140,000 documents. and until they actually will articulate specifically why they should not be given those to this committee, remember the president said he didn't know about this, the president said he was not involved. now suddenly, literally, 15 minutes before we're starting this hearing, he suddenly comes to the conclusion that, well, maybe i should invoke executive privilege, which under my understanding means that he somehow was personally involved. i think that begs more questions

than answers, it's disappointing that this has to happen at this late hour. yield back. >> first of all, i support the amendment, but mr. welch, let me tell you that in the letter that the deputy attorney general, one of the things they refer to as a letter of june 13. from chairman issa. and they say that in that letter, it says the committee is now -- it is said that the committee is now focused on documents from after february 4. you understand the they got a

letter a week ago saying this is what we're spotlighting. when you talked about the things changing, things did change, they became narrower. and so the focus was on -- became the february -- post february 4 documents, that is the ones that would go to retaliation against employees if there was such. so then you talked about how privileged logs and things of that nature, you got to remember. in a way, i understand what the chairman is saying, but in a way the goal post did change a little bit. >> right. >> and it changed a week ago. and this whole privileged log

thing, you actually have to go through the documents, you got to focus on that stuff. the attorney general has said all along that he was willing to provide documents, but also he needed time to do that. also i want to go back to what mr. davis has said, is that this attorney general is the one who said that these tactics must come to an end. they weren't going to an end under mukasey. this attorney general said they must come to an end and this attorney general asked for the ig investigation. and there's something going on here that really should bother all of us and that is that we do have an attorney general who just like we did, swear to uphold the constitution of the united states. and it seems to be a presumption

that when certain privileges are asserted, certain concerns are raised by the attorney general, with regard to deliberative documents, things that go on between staff, things that have traditionally been privileged, that someone has to be hiding something, that it has to be dishonest and i think we do have to respect the separation of powerings here, people are saying, what is he hiding? i don't think he's hiding a damned thing, he said this during this meeting with him yesterday. he made it clear that this was hiss watch. and that there's certain things that attorney generals protect as a part of this office. not of eric holder but this office and he said that he's going to protect those thing but

at the same time trying to accommodate the committee. it's easy to presume the negative, but maybe, just maybe, the attorney general is trying to do what attorney generals have traditionally done but at the same time have tried to work with the committee to accommodate the committee and i would recommend to everyone, if you take a look at the letter that was sent today, because he basically lays out in that letter, what his efforts have been, what he'll continue to do and going back to the chairman, i know that no matter what the vote is today, that the attorney general will continue to try to work with this committee to make things work. and so that we can do our job, and so that he can do his job. he's got a job, too. and i respect that i listened to him yesterday, and it was clear to me that he wanted to try to

work things out to do that balancing, and i would hope that no matter what happens in his vote, we would continue to work with him so that we can get the information that we need. >> would the gentleman yield? >> certainly. >> do you recall that if there were a vote of contempt that he said there would be no cooperation? >> sometimes sitting in a meeting with you can be rough. i mean a heated moment. >> i don't think yesterday was particularly heated. you didn't think it was eated, i did. i think he said something to the effect that things would be difficult, but if you look at the letter today, after having a night to rest over it. i think this letter says very clearly, i want to work with you. >> and i certainly hope so.

i thank the gentleman. and now i recognize the gentleman from oklahoma, mr. langford. >> thank you, mr. chairman, on this thought that this was something new that was thrown out recently, we have thrown out 22 different categories, those have since been narrowed down to one. this is one of those categories that was given in october of last year, january 31st, the chairman wrote to the attorney general of this year, he also sent him a valentine card on february 14, asking for these same documents again. so while it's easy to say this didn't come up until last week and there's no way he can get it together. it's hard to imagine getting the subpoena last october, getting a letter in january, getting a letter in february, finally we can't get to the point to say it's time to turn these things over. even if he just got it friday, he would have time to turn over two documents, so far he's given

us all of zero documents related to this. so this is not something that i'm just in a hurry, i couldn't get to it, this is a systematic stalling, delaying, i'm not going to turn over documents, i do want to mention a couple of things as well. this attorney general and this d.o.j. has been more than willing to turn over documents related to the previous administration, in fact immediately started throwing out things related to wide receiver even when they're not requested. so bring in a former attorney general, fine we didn't get to do it, but the duty of a reform committee is to administrate current administrative actions. i know we want to relive things from the bush administration, and while i didn't think it's the gentleman's intent smacks of