U.S.A. – -(Ammoland.com)- “Mexican cartels such as CJNG or Jalisco New Generation and Sinaloa cartels are arming themselves with military-grade weapons,” Fox News 29 San Antonio reports. “And the Mexican government is saying most of these destructive weapons, such as AK-47 and M-16 are coming from the United States.
“At least 2.5 million illegal firearms were smuggled into Mexico during the last 10 years, according to a new Mexican government study,” the report continues. In other words, the multiple rifle sale reporting requirement ATF imposed on the four border states of Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Texas did what we can expect from all such “commonsense gun safety laws”: Absolutely nothing. Except infringe on the rights of Americans and show that the real issue is a porous border that Democrats want to keep open for their superhighway to citizenship…
It’s no surprise that ATF had been calling for that edict for years. Back in 2008, ABC News got it straight from ATF Phoenix Field Division Special Agent in Charge Bill Newell. Remember him? He was the guy who headed up the disastrously lethal “gunwalking” plot known as Operation Fast and Furious. He’s also the guy who started another chain reaction that led all the way up to Obama’s White House denying House Oversight access to a witness, another in a series of stonewalling outrages I’ve been writing about for years.
It’s also no surprise that ABC News parroted the Violence Policy Center deception to sow deliberate “confusion” in the public’s mind between semiautomatics and machineguns. Did everybody notice Fox 29 did the same thing as if you can go in and walk out of any gun store with a straw-purchased select-fire rifle? (Not that you shouldn’t be able to.)
If you want to find the sources for real military ordnance finding its way into the hands of the cartels, look no further than Mexico’s southern border or from corrupt government officials taking advantage of U.S. State Department-authorized exports to Mexican police and the military.
There are more big lies lie that Fox 29 repeated, oblivious to realities those who actually know what they’re talking about figured out years ago:
The Mexican government says 70% of crimes committed with guns in Mexico are linked to guns that came from the U.S. and of those, more than 40% come from Texas alone. Sanchez says the weapons that are crossing the border are extremely dangerous.
“We’ve seen a dramatic increase in the types of firearms and the caliber of firearms today than what we saw 10 years ago. For example, 10 years ago you may see a revolver or a semi-automatic pistol, and now it’s not uncommon at all to see an assault rifle, assault rifle converted into an automatic assault rifle, grenades, grenade launchers, and these high caliber type rifles,” says Sanchez.
Let’s take the second lie first. Operation Fast and Furious was more than a few handguns. And here’s a report from 2009 by The Los Angeles Times:
“Traffickers have escalated their arms race, acquiring military-grade weapons, including hand grenades, grenade launchers, armor-piercing munitions and antitank rockets with firepower far beyond the assault rifles and pistols that have dominated their arsenals. Most of these weapons are being smuggled from Central American countries or by sea, eluding U.S. and Mexican monitors who are focused on the smuggling of semiautomatic and conventional weapons purchased from dealers in the U.S. border states of Texas, New Mexico, Arizona and California.”
Now let’s talk about the other big lie, about the percentage du jour of “Mexican crime guns” the grabbers would have us believe come from U.S. gun shops and gun shows.
They never could get the numbers right.
“American gun sellers supply the cartels with 95 to 100 percent of their guns,” Kathleen Kennedy Townsend and former Brady Center President Paul Helmke wrung their hands and shrieked for CNN back in 2009.
“It is estimated that at least 90% of the guns used by the Mexican drug trafficking organizations have come from the US.,” BBC News weighed in that same year.
“According to a new report, U.S. Firearms Trafficking to Mexico … about 80%, or 60,000 firearms, came from the United States,” Huffington Post contributor and former Brady Center honcho Dennis Henigan of the Brady Center assured readers in 2011.
Here’s what I wrote about those BS numbers back in March 2009:
I’d like to share with you a bit of testimony, from the Statement of David Ogden, Deputy Attorney General, United States Department of Justice, before the United States Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs hearing entitled “Southern Border Violence: Homeland Security Threats, Vulnerabilities, and Responsibilities”, presented March 25, 2009. Just a small bit, really, but a critical one, almost lost in the 20 pages of his statement:
“According to ATF’s Tracing Center, 90 percent of the firearms about which ATF receives information are traceable to the United States.”
Read it again, and compare it to what the antis are saying. It’s very different, isn’t it?
It’s not all the guns recovered, just those submitted for tracing, which, per a 2009 Fox News report noted:
“There’s just one problem with the 90 percent “statistic” and it’s a big one: It’s just not true. In fact, it’s not even close. The fact is, only 17 percent of guns found at Mexican crime scenes have been traced to the U.S.”
This information has been out there for over a decade, yet the American public is still being subjected to disinformation by a media that is either hopelessly incompetent, deliberately misleading, or both.
Case in point, this Feb. 24 report by the Louisville Courier Journal (a Gannett Publication) about a DEA supervisor and “veteran lawman” convicted of running guns to the cartels, repeats this by now familiar lie:
“At least 70% of weapons seized in Mexico — including many guns used by cartels in massacres — were made in or came through America, according to the U.S. Government Accountability Office.”
Do you get the feeling that those who presume to instruct us don’t even belong in the damn classroom without passing some prerequisites?
This is beyond journalistic malpractice. These are the people I started out calling “Authorized Journalists,” then Fourth Estate Fifth Columnists, and of late, the DSM (Duranty/Streicher Media).
Through ignorance or intent, they’re conditioning a public that doesn’t know any better (as evidenced by the idiot way most answer polls) to accept the same lies that led to “walking” guns across the border and untold deaths, all as part of a cynical and evil mine-salting swindle to gin up support for more citizen disarmament. And these are the ones with the power to dominate, and marginalize reports exposing their lies of commission and omission as “fake news.”
Remember that old Yogi Berra quote?
“It’s Deja Vu all over again.”
Except what happens next won’t be funny at all.
About David Codrea:
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating/defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament. He blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” is a regularly featured contributor to Firearms News, and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.
Hell open the border Joe ! Mexico needs some more firearms & the US needs more drugs. The big man just wants his 30%.b
Our government has always been good at arming our enemies.
No logic or common sense in the reports, but the majority of the public believe anything from the media, no matter how ludicrous (Covid, the 2020 election, etc.). Why would any cartel pay hundreds and even thousands for an illegal gun in the USA and risk smuggling it into Mexico, when they can easily purchase hundreds of guns (cases) and ammo, wholesale from manufacturers and dealers in Europe and Asia and import them directly into Mexico either legally or via crooked customs agents at harbors and airports?
I am still waiting to see the Obama administration and Eric Holder held accountable for Fast and furious. Until this is done the government does not have the authority to take anyone’s guns . Equal protection under the law for all . If Eric Holder is exempt from prosecution then so is everybody else . The double standard and lies from the media and government only discredits them and makes thier gun laws unconstitutional . ” SHALL NOT BE INFRINGED ” and MOLON LABE .
Part of the article talked about how cartels are smuggling from the south while US and Mexico focus on US border and the lighter small arms which could come from here. I imagine that many regular Mexican people (not government and not cartel) might try to acquire defensive tools from the US. The peasants of northern Mexico do not have means to smuggle heavy weaponry from the south.
It is almost like the governments are colluding to disarm the regular-honest people while encouraging gang violence.
edited photo. some of barrels on the first bottom row are going though the stocks of the rifles on the second row. second row of rifles look like they might be floating. i don’t know maybe not. but the pic looks weird