todd jones, the new director of the federal bureau of alcohol, firearms, tobacco and explosives. agency, charged with keeping track of the nation's 300 million guns, lacked a permanent head for the last seven years. jones was appointed shortly after the tragic shooting at sandy hook elementary in newtown, connecticut, and confirmed in july. i spoke with him this afternoon at the bureau's headquarters here in washington. director todd jones, thank you for talking with us. >> well, thank you for being here. >> woodruff: in your confirmation hearings to become the director of alcohol, tobacco, firearms and explosives you call this an agency in distress. others have called it the neglected stepchild of federal law enforcement. they've called it bureau under siege. how do you see it now that you're here? >> i call it a resilient law enforcement agency. i have the privilege of serving in an acting capacity for two years which gave me the benefit of getting to know the people, getting to know the organization better, and also identifying some immediate actions that we wanted to take and

todd jones, the new director of the federal bureau of alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and explosives. the first half of our conversation focused on the agency's responsibility for keeping track of the nation's 300 million firearms. tonight, we discuss urban violence, "fast and furious," and illegal cigarette profits going to terrorists. we talked late last week at the bureau's headquarters here in washington. >> todd jones, the director of the bureau of alcohol, tobacco, firearms an explosives, thank you for talking with us. >> thank you, judy. >> woodruff: so how do you describe what the priorities are today, 2013, for this agency? >> well, i think really it's digested down to three things for me. one is to get the organization healthy. both from a morale standpoint, from a human resources standpoint, from a policies and procedure os standpoint. we need to get healthier. we're about to lose a generation of agents and that's creating some challenges for us in terms of that knowledge transfer that we're going to need. second is to implement our new business practices which is really dr

todd jones talks about the challenge of reigning in gun