TGDA Board to meet with new director Sept. 21 to discuss industry issues

Attorney General John Ashcroft has appointed Carl J. Truscott to be the sixth director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, in the Department of Justice. Truscott, who began his tenure as director on April 18, took the oath at the Department of Justice in a private ceremony on May 17.

“Carl brings strong leadership and immense law enforcement expertise to the Bureau as they work to combat crime and protect the public,” said Ashcroft. “ATF plays a crucial role in our work to fight violent crime, and I am confident Carl will assist ATF in achieving this and other key priorities.” 

Prior to his job in the Treasury Department as Assistant Director of

the Secret Service, Truscott served as the Special Agent in Charge of the Presidential Protective Division, where he had primary responsibility for supervising all protective matters relating to the President, First Family and the White House.

“I am honored to join a strong and diverse workforce of men and women dedicated to the bureau’s unique and historic missions of protecting the public and reducing violent crime, and committed to enforcing the laws and regulations under our purview with character and integrity,” Truscott said. “I will seek to provide them with strategic leadership and vision that honors the finest traditions of ATF and the Department of Justice.”

Truscott’s appointment comes at a time when serious issues face federally licensed firearms dealers across the country. At its spring meeting in Austin, the TGDA Board of Directors identified several of these issues and voted unanimously to meet with BATFE staff to resolve the problems.

In March, TGDA President, Bill Carter, sent a letter to the BATFE requesting a meeting with the staff and members of the TGDA Board of Directors to discuss two issues of serious concern to licensed firearms dealers in Texas and across the country.

In the letter, Carter referred to a letter sent to all FFLs from Lewis Raden, the Bureaus’s Executive Assistant, Legislative Affairs, that emphasized the importance of maintaining a partnership between the Bureau and the firearms industry and to reinforce our joint responsibilities under the Gun Control Act.

“We agree the only way to effectively fight terrorism, firearms trafficking, and other related criminal activities, is to work together to reach our mutual goals,” said Carter. “We want to be a part of our country's homeland security solution.”

To prove this, TGDA recently worked with the Bureau on modifications to Form 4473 that improved compliance without burdening the industry. This joint effort was a big success for both parties. In addition, the association worked with the FBI over the past four years to improve NICS response time, which has benefited both our industry and the FBI. “We have clearly demonstrated that we want to work with government to resolve problems and form better solutions for everyone,” said Carter.

Carter emphasized that both TGDA and the Bureau now have an opportunity to continue this partnership and build an even stronger foundation for preventing criminal activities by addressing two issues of serious concern to the FFLs in Texas and across the country.

The first issue deals with the Bureau’s current efforts to define crime guns and hold FFLs accountable for firearms used in criminal activities. Since 9/11, TGDA members have doubled their efforts to conduct business lawfully and in accordance with Bureau regulations. We realize the need to make certain that each firearm transfer is performed correctly and lawfully. Yet, the Bureau's current threshold for crime gun dealers has placed many law abiding FFLs under unreasonable scrutiny and subjected some to possible penalty.

In short, the issue is the Bureau maintains the same crime gun threshold for a dealer who sells 100 guns per year as it does for a dealer who sells 10,000. This low threshold virtually insures that lawful dealers who sell large numbers of firearms will never be able to avoid the Bureau’s crime gun dealer list. That type of regulation is inherently flawed and should be changed to a more reasonable standard for those dealers who are abiding by the law. “We would like to meet with you and your staff to discuss reasonable alternatives and reach a solution that protects our country and FFLs who truly maintain lawful operations,” said Carter.

The second issue presented to the Bureau was the unreasonable enforcement of grammatical errors on the Form 4473. Recently, FFLs across the state have received a violation on their record for grammatical errors such as misspelled words, misused abbreviations, lack of symbols for feet (’) and inches (’’) for height, and other minor mistakes. “Grammatical errors should not be viewed as a violation since they do not prevent the proper identification of the purchaser with NICS or the lawful transfer of the firearm,” said Carter. “We fully understand that Form 4473 is a legal document and needs to be completed accurately and correctly. Many dealers have hired additional personnel to proofread these forms for accuracy. However, dealers are being held to unreasonable standards in their audit reviews.”

Carter referred to a recent audit by the Bureau staff of a licensed dealer in Texas that revealed only four errors – all grammatical – out of approximately 10,000 4473s. All four errors were sited in the auditor’s report as violations.

Another dealer with only eight violations out of thousands of 4473s was called to a hearing before the Bureau for possible license revocation. “This undefined standard is both unjust and unreasonable and should be reviewed immediately,” said Carter. “These issues need to be addressed as soon as possible to prove a partnership between the Bureau and FFLs really exists. We think it does, and we would like to meet with you to discuss these problems and develop solutions that will benefit everyone.”

As a result of the letter, a meeting between TGDA Board members and Bureau staff has been scheduled for September 21 in Washington. Bill Carter, Joe McBride, and Donnie Durbin will attend on behalf of the TGDA Board of Directors and membership. Results of the meeting will be forwarded to TGDA members following the meeting.