inside of the u.s.-mexican border. his killers were not taliban or al-qaeda. but a small group of mexican drug cartel bandits heavily armed with ak-47 assault rifles. sean: the family is not just left to grieve but also to look for answers. every one of the men and women involved in fast and furious, based on my experience are men and women of good faith who wanted to do the right thing. but they hadn t fully thought about the consequences of their actions. and that inablility to look into the future to understand the risks that they were taking, is their down fall. and maybe, although we don t yet know, the reason for brian terry s tragic death. sean: very sad, very unnecessary story. if you would like to help the terry family and the families
july 26th, for the first time special agent in charge, bill newell revealed he informed a top national security official at the white house about the operation in september 2010. [ unintelligible ] how many times did you talk to him about in case. the specifics of this case? i don t think i had one specific conversation with him about the specifics of this case. could you take the word specific out and answer the general, did you talk to him about this case? i might have talked to him about this case, yes. sean: o reilly is the first aide to president obama to publicly be accused to have knowledge of this operation. what is unclear is whether he shared this information with anybody inside the white house. coming up, one of the people most responsible for
prior to coming to phoenix i never heard of an operation which law enforcement officers let guns walk. the idea is unthinkable to most law enforcement. i and other field agents repeatedly raised these concerns with our supervisors. in response we were told we did not understand the plan. sean: july 4th, facing mounting scrutiny over the botched operation and calls for his resignation, melson appeared secretly before congressional investigators from the house oversight committee and senate judiciary committee where he testified that mistakes were made by atf and officials withheld information to protect political appointees at the top of the department. in a joint letter written following the meetings issa and grassley argued, if his account is accurate atf leadership appears to have been muzzled while the doj sent false denials and buried its head in the sand.
every person responsible for all of this, no matter where they are, are brought to justice. sean: welcome to this special edition of hannity. tonight we investigate operation fast and furious. the controversial program initiated by the justice department s bureau of alcohol, tobacco and firearms. it grew out of the border initiative call project gun runner. when the program began under the bush administration in 2006, the purpose was to reduce firearms and explosives related to violent crime associated with mexican criminal organizations operating in the u.s. and mexico by preventing these organizations if unlawfully acquiring and trafficking firearms and explosives. for the program that began with the best of intentions expanded after president obama took office and veered sharply off course. empower activity that it set
for cartels crossing the border is the beginning. stepped up enforcement near cities has pushed them into remote areas like arizona s canyon, a dangerous smuggling corridor 14 miles north of the fence. the terrain is rough. not driveable by vehicle, not driveable by atv. the violence in that area is very high. sean: much of the canyon looks more like afghanistan than the united states. there are numerous canyons he sean: this rugged landscape the cartels wage war against each other on american soil. you got the mules that are packing the drugs. they are armed. then you ve got the people that are going to rip them off. sean it is called smuggler s paradise hot hot spot for armed cartel rip crews. rip crews are aiming at