now assistant attorney general lani brewer admitting to the u.s.e knew that was not true, and he knew it nearly a year before that representation was made to congress when he learned about a gun-walking program, not fast and furious, but a different one called operation wide receiver. watch this. >> on february the 4th 2011 the department sent me a letter also assuring me that allegations of gun walking were untrue. it reads, quote, atf makes every effort to interdict weapons that have been purchased illegally and prevent their transportation to mexico, end of quote. that statement is absolutely false, and you admitted as much last night that you knew by april 2010 that the atf walked guns in operation wide receiver. that's correct, yes? >> yes, senator, what i -- >> that's all i need to know. is that's correct. did you review the letter before it was sent to me. >> i want to be clear as i told you a moment ago i regret in april of 2010 that i did not draw the connection between wide receiver and if's and furious. moreover i regret that even in ear

documents released this afternoon show the head of the justice department's criminal division, lani brewer, learned as early as april of 2010 about the tactic used by a.t.f. known as gun walking. in a memo, brewer's deputy wrote in a case called "wide receiver" started under the bush administration "a.t.f. let a bunch of guns walk in an effort to catch the big fish of mexican drug cartels" and said the gun walking case could be "embarrassing" to a.t.f. today, brewer issued a statement saying he regrets he didn't alert others in the justice department leadership, apparently including his boss attorney general holder. in a separate case started under the obama administration which cbs news reported on this year, breuer says he like wise regrets not alerting leaders about the similarities of the cases. ouat, says breuer, was a mistake. republican congressional investigators say this new information contradicts the justice department's original letter to them earlier this year insisted that gun walking allegations were false. >> pelley: sharyl, thank you very much. a russian spy ring in americ

. >> reporter: eric holder and lani brewer both claim ignorance about the operation.erries don't buy it. >> i know they are lying, they are just nothing but liars. >> reporter: tuesday lawmakers asked if holder wanted to apologize, he declined saying only. >> i certainly regret what happened. >> i bet if he lost his son he would think different. >> reporter: he has since says he's story. while the murder weapons are linked to fast and furious he says the weapons did not directly lead to the agent's death. >> i disagree with that. i think they are. brand-new ak-47's they were carrying. >> if they would have never left those guns walk maybe brian won't have been in that desert. >> reporter: to some officials brian was collateral damage. to his parents he was everything. >> i can't sleep anything about him, you know, i love him very much. >> reporter: i was in the terries living room yesterday where news broke that eric holder had written a letter of apology. they were stunned that neither the attorney who was with there with me had received a letter, neither had the fam

>> at least the assistant attorney general, lani brewer. also, i think what you had on there that holder was being asked isn't entirely accurate, from the standpoint that he had a lot of memos going across his desk in the summer 2010, and if he didn't read those, why wasn't he reading the memos? he should have known about it way back then. megyn: he said he told the senator as we played in part in that sound byte. i have ultimate responsibility here, but i cannot be expected to know details of ever operation going on on a day-to-day basis. that is his response to you. do you not find that adequate. >> i do not find it adequate. i believe we get too much information that is conflicting. i'll give you an example. right here we asked a lot about the february 4th letters today, and we got answers that were a week ago, they admitted had false information. megyn: i want to get our viewers up to speed on what you're referring to. back in january of 2011 you presented eric holder with letters detailing this operation, wanting to know the truth abou

they also waited until the night before the head of the criminal division, lani brewer, was set to testify before the judiciary committee to provide 652 pages of documents. mr. brewer also admitted to knowing all about gun walking and -- in what's referred to as operation wide receiver as far back as april, 2010. now, we have to go through these new documents to see what they contain, but the first smaller batch of documents include several memos to attorney general holder that appear to contradict the attorney general's earlier claim that he had never heard of fast and furious until sometime april this year. the documents also show that attorney general holder's current chief of staff received a detailed briefing 18 months ago, march of 2010. he was the acting deputy attorney general at the time, so obviously the number-two person in the justice department. the deputy attorney general even took detailed handwritten notes on the presentation. however, attorney general holder says that he didn't know anything about it until after the controversy became public. that's also what mr. brewer sa