By Dave Workman
Editor-in-Chief
A veteran broadcast journalist writing at the Baltimore Sun is reporting how many of the U.S.-manufactured guns used in violent Mexican crimes were originally sold directly to the Mexican government, and it brought a swift reaction from an American gun rights group, demanding an investigation.
Reporter Sharyl Attkisson, founder and anchor at Full Measure, is reporting that gun smuggling and “loose gun laws” blamed by anti-gunners for Mexican violence may not be so much to blame as government guns which somehow find their way into criminal hands. She notes in her 526-word report how 779 U.S.-source guns found at Mexican crime scenes were “originally bought by the Mexican government.”
For more than 15 years, since the revelation of the “Operation Fast and Furious” scandal which unraveled during the Obama administration—in which some 2,000 guns were allowed by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives to “walk” across the border from Arizona—most people believed that illicit gun trafficking was fueling the violence. Attkisson’s report, which featured former ATF agent and whistleblower John Dodson, is “flipping the script with a jaw-dropping twist.” That twist is the Mexican government being the source of crime guns.
The report got a quick reaction from the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms, which called for a joint investigation by Congress and the Trump administration.
“Until we get some answers,” said CCRKBA Chairman Alan Gottlieb, “all U.S. government-approved gun sales to Mexico should be halted…The Mexican government had the audacity to sue American gun companies for problems it created in its own country. Mexico owes the U.S., its firearms businesses and its gun-owning citizens an apology, and instead of blaming us, they need to admit their own culpability for the bloody violence that is continuing to grip their nation.”
In a prepared statement, Gottlieb declared, “Contrary to what America has been told for years—that Mexican crime guns are obtained illicitly from U.S. gun dealers thanks to lax gun laws here—it now appears the Mexican government may be a major source of those firearms. Once again, it appears U.S. gun dealers and the Second Amendment have been taking the rap for violent crimes in another country, when the truth is staggering.”
It’s a storyline which has taken on a life of its own, as gun prohibition lobbying groups such as Giffords have pushed an anti-gun agenda using Mexican crime as a foundation. For example, Giffords published an “analysis” in which it talked about a USA Today report published in May 2024 about how U.S. gun shops and smugglers were the source of “nearly 80,000 firearms illegally trafficked into Mexico.”
But, according to Attkisson’s article, “We reviewed data from 2016 to 2023. It confirms the Mexican government was the top buyer of U.S. guns later traced to crime scenes in Mexico. One document shows the Mexican military, listed as ‘dealer,’ purchased more than 2,000 from 2016 through 2021.”
“The American people have a right to know the full truth,” said Gottlieb. “The movement of American firearms into the hands of Mexican drug cartels is now more than just an Obama administration scandal. This is no longer a tale about a rogue ATF operation and a bunch of gunrunners, it’s a scandal involving the Mexican government.
“Contrary to what America has been told for years—that Mexican crime guns are obtained illicitly from U.S. gun dealers thanks to lax gun laws here—it now appears the Mexican government may be a major source of those firearms,” he added. “Once again, it appears U.S. gun dealers and the Second Amendment have been taking the rap for violent crimes in another country, when the truth is staggering.”
