"....to Keep and Bear Arms for War"

FIRST HALF: The DOJ is suing the city of Denver over their "assault weapons" ban and the furious howling by the mayor and top law enforcement officials engendered thereby.

SECOND HALF: The attempted whitewashing of the ATF by appointing Robert Cekeda as the new head of this rights-eating monster and the implications for the rights of the People and the gun industry.

Transcript

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We are locked, loaded, and loud on the Shooting Straight radio podcast. This is all about firearms
with a heavy emphasis on the Second Amendment and all things pertaining thereto.
I am Royce, your cute, cuddly host, pouring it to you from both barrels with 100% felt recoil and
no suppressor at all. Please forgive me in advance. I'm dealing with a bout of my trigeminal
neuralgia. So if words come out sounding funny as I'm talking, go ahead and just chalk that up to
that, please. We have a low-pressure system sitting over the house right now,
and it's doing wonderful things to my brain. So anyway, let's get into things.
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All right, let's tear right on into things. Got a lot to talk about, so let's get her done.
Many of you have probably heard that the Department of Justice has filed lawsuit against Denver.
Why only the city of Denver and not the entire state, which has outlawed so-called assault
weapons, which they had no constitutional authority to do. But they have sued Denver over their
unconstitutional assault weapons ban. They brought a suit against them,
I think just what day, on the 5th, I think.
This ban of theirs has been in place for 37 years, and the DOJ is going after it.
While this is a great first step, I hope you guys continue there at DOJ to go after all of the
other states in the union and flat out tell them that these bans are unconstitutional and you will
back the heck off. It's going to cause quite a stir, and I guarantee you there's going to be a lot
of defiance from all the communist-occupied territories, but so be it.
So with that, we're going to get into an article by Paolo Ziasita from May 4th,
and Denver is being very defiant against this administration's order to repeal that longstanding
ban. And they, of course, they have all the ferocity and tenacity of Tampon Timmy there in
Minnesota. So take this with a grain of salt. But we're going to go through here and look at some
things, take some things that they themselves said, and tear it apart with the facts about the
Second Amendment and the Constitution. So here's the article. The Trump administration.
sued the city of Denver on Tuesday over the city's assault weapons ban.
The 37-year-old law violates the Second Amendment, the Department of Justice argues.
The local law makes it a crime, quote, to carry, store,
keep, manufacture, sell, or otherwise possess assault weapons in Denver.
Well... That law is automatically null and void, but the people are going to have to enforce this
principle from Marbury v. Madison, which clearly declared the supremacy of the Constitution over...
All, any and all laws to the contrary. But the people are going to have to enforce this because the
Supreme Court of the United States seems to have no testicular fortitude to actually enforce even
their own rulings like the Bruin principle. So the article continues. The Trump administration has
said it would not immediately file a lawsuit if the city agreed to compromise its ban.
But city officials strongly rejected the threat.
Well, there should have been no compromise offered in the least anyway. Denver Mayor Mike Johnston
said Monday the city will not bend the knee to a legal threat from the U.S.
Department of Justice. over the city's long-standing assault weapons ban.
Well, of course he won't bend the knee, because he hasn't bent the knee to the Supreme Law,
so refusing to bend the knee to a Supreme Court precedent, that's hardly a surprise.
Last week, Harmeet Dillon, an assistant attorney general with the DOJ's Civil Rights Division,
wrote, to Denver officials to inform them that the federal government intends to file a lawsuit in
federal district court against the city and Denver Police Department for a Second Amendment
violation. And here's the argument from Dillon,
Armeet Dillon. He says, law-abiding Americans own and use for lawful purposes,
literally. Tens of millions of AR-15 style rifles.
Indeed, it is the most popular rifle in America. The city has banned an arm,
and this is, again, this really chafes my backside, in common use for lawful purposes by law
-abiding citizens. Therefore, the ordinance violates the Second Amendment.
The ordinance... bans the sale and possession of certain firearms within city limits.
The letter said the DOJ would consider delaying the lawsuit if the city were willing to negotiate
an end to the ban. At minimum, the department requested Denver immediately stop enforcing the ban.
and to acknowledge the unconstitutionality of the so-called assault weapons ban and enter a court
enforceable consent decree, a decree, I'm sorry, that permanently prevents the city from banning
assault weapons. Well, the people of Denver need to demand the same.
In a letter sent to the DOJ on Monday, Denver City Attorney Miko Brown describes the request as,
quote, baseless, irresponsible, and a clear overreach of the federal government's power.
Wow, you project much, huh? Because he's literally accusing the DOJ of exactly what Denver is
doing. Yes, they're overreaching. power that they were never given in the first place.
I don't know if Colorado has preemption laws like Florida and many other states do,
but it's unconscionable to me that a city in any state can pass any laws it wants to,
whether they, what should I say, they are agreeable to the state's constitution or not.
That's simply a recipe for despotism. Yeah. Brown brought up several similar challenges to assault
weapons bans across the nation that have failed. And then he said, therefore,
even if your bald, unsupported statement that literally tens of billions of AR-style rifles are
held by private individuals is true, and you have presented no evidence showing it is,
your point is irrelevant. Well, first of all, idiot. A simple Google search can tell you how many
of these things are actually owned by peaceable Americans. And you speak about this as being
irrelevant. It's nowhere near as irrelevant as Denver's illegal ban on these weapons.
That law is irrelevant on its face because it flies in the face.
of the Constitution, the supreme law, the law that enjoys primacy and supremacy over any and all
laws to the contrary.
Johnston doubled down on the city's defense of the ban, on the steps of the city and county
building, and of course, nice photo op here, flanked by police chief Ron Thomas,
other city officials, and... Gun control advocates. Shocking.
Gee, they wouldn't be behind some of this crap now, would they? They probably gave him his talking
points. Johnston said, we're here today to let them know that our answer is hell no.
No, we will not roll back a common sense policy that has kept weapons of war off of these city
streets for 37 years. You never had weapons of war on your streets in the first place,
jackass.
The ban's been in place there since 1989. My response to that is, so what?
Slavery was in place here in this country for 87 years, not 37 years.
Did that qualify it? Did that justify it? Did that sanctify it as constitutional?
Denver City Council passed the assault weapons ban in 1989, following a spike in violent crime in
the metro area, none of which was being committed with assault weapons.
The ban came at the recommendation of Ari Zavaros, a Democrat communist,
by the way, the police chief at the time. And the Denver Code of Ordinance reads thusly,
The city council hereby finds and declares that the use of assault weapons poses a threat to the
health, safety, and security of all citizens of the city and county of Denver.
Further, the council finds. that assault weapons are capable both of a rapid rate of fire as well
as of a capacity to fire an inordinately large number of rounds without reloading and are designed
primarily for military or anti-personnel use. Okay,
that means we have a right to own them. That means the people of Denver have a right to own them
because they're suited for military use by your own, you know.
assumption. Frankly, I want, you know, if I'm going to be going into battle, I want to select fire
weapon. Actually, I want a belt-fed weapon. Yeah, you'd want to talk about an inordinate rate of
fire. Try a Dillon Aero 30 caliber minigun.
I got to shoot one of those things once. Oh, baby. Yeah. You want to talk about a rapid rate of
fire. But, sir, those are the same weapons your police keep in bear.
How come they're not considered oh so dangerous when they have them?
The man was almost immediately challenged, but has withstood several attempts to overturn it.
Yeah, because it was tried in front of liberal judges. According to the Denver Post,
but this appears to be the first federal challenge to Denver's assault weapons ban. Police Chief
Thomas praised the assault weapons ban, claiming that it has helped keep the city safe.
Has it really? I did a little search on Denver crime rate,
violent crime rate, firearm crime rate, and you guys have literally,
within just the last few weeks, had a surge in firearm-related homicides.
Yeah. And now for the self-contradicting statement of the month,
incoming, here it comes. He said it's difficult to measure prevention.
Wait a minute, though. Didn't you just say that it helped keep the city safe in spite of,
you know, in the face of the glaring statistics showing your violent crime rate with firearms
rising?
It's difficult to measure prevention. But I think it don't matter what you think,
sir. It matters what the facts are and what the Constitution says.
But I think that the fact that people cannot purchase, own, possess assault weapons in the city of
Denver clearly has been a preventative measure. I thought you just said you couldn't measure it.
Oh, but I think it has. Okay, can you qualify it with anything better than that?
Better than your assumption, huh? Are you trying to say that the criminals are obeying the laws
that banned them? Is that it? Is that what you're trying to say? Now, here's another instance where
these little communists always get smoked by their own comments. Yeah.
He said this, I know that of the 2,100 guns that were recovered in Denver last year,
stop right there.
Did you catch that?
2,100 guns recovered from crime scenes in Denver within the space of 365 days.
Your police in Denver are confiscating roughly six guns.
Daily, in Denver alone.
Yeah.
You want to tell us how safe Denver is again, huh? I know that of the 2,100 guns that were
recovered in Denver last year, less than 40 of them were assault-style weapons.
And he's pointing to that saying, there's proof this is working. Okay, number one,
more people than ever are being shot. in your freaking streets, you braying jackass.
But you say, well, only 40 of them were assault weapons, so our preventive measures are working.
No, what you're proving is that assault weapons were never the freaking problem in the first place.
Now, the next paragraph... what I just said.
Still, the department has struggled with curbing gun violence in recent years due to the
proliferation of non-assault weapons in Denver. Oh,
does that mean they were all defensive weapons and not the assaulty kind? Are you not essentially
saying, well, yeah, people are getting shot at a much higher rate than ever,
but at least they're not getting shot with assault weapons as much as the other guns. Make it make
sense. As only you liberals can. The state also received a letter from the Trump administration.
Attorney General Phil Weiser's office confirmed it also received a letter Monday attacking a
statewide ban on large capacity magazines. The 2013 law outlaws the sale of ammo magazines that can
hold more than 15 rounds. Of course, that doesn't apply to the police. It was passed in the wake of
the mass shooting at a Denver movie theater in Aurora in which the gunman used a 100-round drum
magazine, that is. Oh, why didn't you just ban the 100-round drum magazines?
What, you have to take it back to 15 rounds so you can only own these. What are you doing?
You're basically saying all of you people are hereby condemned because of the actions of one
person. Yeah, you're condemned. Everybody's condemned. None of you can have these high-capacity
magazines because of the actions of one psycho who walked into a theater and hosed a bunch of
people down.
Similar to the demand it made to Denver, the DOJ said it would delay filing a lawsuit if the state
stopped enforcing the ban. Weiser said in a statement that he would also not comply with the DOJ's
demands. Then you know what? You need to go to freaking prison, he said to Colorado Supreme Court.
Ruled unanimously that the state's large capacity magazine limitation law is constitutional under
the state constitution.
It ain't constitutional under the supreme law. And I believe the law has reasonable limitations
that satisfy Second Amendment protections. Really? How? Go ahead and explain that.
Qualify that statement. How? How is magazine limitation?
a reasonable limitation and that somehow is acceptable under the Second Amendment,
especially when the Second Amendment covers all arms for warfare.
Yeah, people, let's get a hold of this. The Second Amendment covers arms for war.
I know I say that a lot on this program. I'm going to keep driving it home until we're all saying
it. Not just AR-15s and AK-47s and semi-automatic Glocks and everything else.
All arms capable of waging warfare. The founders wanted it that way so that if our government and
their arms ever decided to come wage war against us, then we would have the same arms to defend
ourselves against them, especially if and when the government decided to become a much larger
criminal organization than this country has ever seen. Yeah.
He said, large capacity magazine laws are responsible policies that decrease the deadly impacts of
mass shootings and save lives. Prove it. Qualify your statement. Oh,
thou with the rising gun violence in your city. You know,
if these things really worked, then the 1994 assault weapons ban under Billy Blue Dress Clinton
would have done the job. But there were 16 very high-profile mass murder by gun under that ban
over a 10-year stretch. One of them was the Columbine Massacre.
Yeah. So, the AR-15, you think that's the only thing we should be discussing as being an
acceptable arm in the hands of the people? No, no, no, no. The Second Amendment protects much more
than that. Yeah. I'm going to dive into an article by Charlie McCarthy, not the ventriloquist
puppet or the other guy, but this is apparently a more contemporary person.
And the title is... Department of Justice, colon, Supreme Court will legalize AR-15s.
The Supreme Court ultimately will legalize the AR-15 semi-automatic rifle throughout the United
States, according to Assistant Attorney General Harmeet Dillon. Okay, stop.
Such weapons are already legalized under the Supreme Law,
Article 2. Not just... capacity magazines and AR-15s.
automatics, but also fully automatic 20 millimeter anti-armor weapons,
50 caliber Browning Ma Deuce machine guns, 30 caliber mini guns,
Mark 19 fully automatic grenade launchers, mortars, Bradley fighting vehicles.
striker fighting vehicles, M1A1 Abrams tanks, and the list goes on.
We, the people, have every right to freaking own them. We are the final authority in this country.
This government exists and operates under our consent.
At least it's supposed to. So where do we get this asinine idea that this government of,
by, and for the people has the right to tell the people that we can only own certain weapons to
defend ourselves against a marauding government?
But, oh my word, I'm trying not to launch here.
You know, the Supreme Court... since 1934, has shirked its duty and responsibility to declare all
gun control laws to be unconstitutional as their authority was so clearly defined in Marbury v.
Madison. You might want to look that up. Their authority, as a Supreme Court,
they had every right to say, no, Congress, this law is null and void. We declare it to be so.
They had every right to scrutinize any law and without the people bringing suit to demand that they
look at it and judge accordingly. They said if a law is unconstitutional,
it's repugnant. If it's repugnant to the Constitution, it is null and void. We the people should
not have to petition the Supreme Court to look at a law passed by Congress and declare whether or
not it's constitutional. We the people have that right. Yeah.
If the Supreme Court is not going to do it, what then? Well, again, since when is the Supreme Court
the final authority in constitutional matters? It's not. We the people are.
And when are we going to start acting like that? That's what I want to know. Back to the article.
Dylan made the prediction after the Justice Department filed a lawsuit this week against the city
of Denver over its longstanding assault weapons restrictions, arguing the ordinance violates the
constitutional rights of law-abiding Americans. Dylan said we intend to make sure they do that.
In other words, make sure that the Supreme Court rules that AR-15s and their like are
constitutional across all 50 states. Why do we need a Supreme Court declaration for this when we
already have the founding documents declaring it back from 1791?
Dillon said the court has really signaled It's several opinions where it is going to do this.
Oh, going with this. I'm sorry. I think there is going to be a ruling eventually from the Supreme
Court that AR-15s are legal for all law-abiding citizens to own and operate.
Oh, that's great, but it doesn't go far enough. What about the .30 caliber miniguns?
What about the Ma Deuce .50 caliber heavy machine gun? What about the Bradley fighting vehicles?
What about all of them? Not just the AR-15. You know, here's the problem.
Gun owners who don't do their homework are going to see this and go, yay, this is a win for us.
No, it isn't. No, it isn't. What this is going to do is establish,
if it does come to fruition, yes, I'll accept it as a minor win,
but until the Supreme Court says all weapons of warfare that our military use,
uses are constitutional for we the people to own if we can freaking afford them.
That's the bottom line.
The lawsuit targets Denver's ban on certain semi-automatic rifles, including AR-15 style
firearms, which the DOJ argues are among the most commonly owned rifles in the country.
Again, one more time. Common ownership is not the deciding criteria for whether or not the
citizenry has a right to certain weapons. The criteria is, are these weapons suitable for warfare?
Y'all remember the, uh, Miller versus United States or United States versus Miller,
where a man was convicted of having a sawed off shotgun and the judge declared that that shotgun
was not covered or protected by the second amendment. Because,
listen, the judge said that that shotgun was deemed unprotected by the Second Amendment because it
was not viewed as an arm suitable for war. That was in the decision.
People look at Miller v. United States as if that's where they began to outlaw.
Oh, sawed-off shotguns. Well, that's part of it, but the big picture people are missing,
the judge said no. The military doesn't use that, so you can't say it has Second Amendment
protections. Do your homework on that. United States versus Miller. The complaint also criticizes
the term assault weapon, as it should. As politically charged language promoted by anti-gun
activists, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche framed the legal battle as part of the Trump
administration's broader effort to bolster Second Amendment protections. Blanche said Tuesday,
quote, the Constitution is not a suggestion and the Second Amendment is not a second class right.
Well, you're right. The Constitution is not a suggestion. It's the freaking law.
Denver's ban on commonly owned semi-automatic firearms directly violates the right to bear arms.
Amen, Mr. Blanche, that's true, but you don't take it far enough. The statement alone by Blanche
saying that, that AR-15s are covered, well, yes, but that's only part of it.
You're proving, sir, that you're part of the group that views this and our ownership of such
weapons as second class. in a very backhanded way. Were he actually,
Mr. Blanche, a constitutional student, he would know and understand that the people have every
right to keep and bear the weapons commonly used by the military and not just in common ownership
by the citizenry. Dillon credited President Donald Trump,
former Attorney General Pam Blondie, and Blanche for prioritizing gun rights.
protections through the doj's newly established second amendment section and he goes on to thank uh
president trump and blah blah blah i don't want to go too deep in it but um um harmeet dylan made a
statement she goes that leads to the inexorable conclusion that the ar-15 is presumptively legal
all over america yes ma'am Just as all other implements of war are also legal for the citizenry to
own That's the bottom line I am tired of accepting piecemeal.
We need someone to come out and say flat out, we the people, we the citizenry are the ones who
fight in the military, who serve in the police forces, who serve in the federal agencies.
You don't get to tell us that only some of us have the right to keep and bear those arms and only
in a military context or only in a police enforcement context. We the people in the constitutional
context have every right to those arms and let us never forget that or lose sight of it or fail to
continue to drive that point home. Let's take a brief commercial timeout. We'll be right back with
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We were discussing in the first half how the Department of Justice is suing the city of Denver.
And my comment was they need to sue multiple states throughout the union for their banning of the
AR-15, not just the city of Denver. I don't know if you're just trying to start a precedent that
you can work off of. That might be the case. But the bottom line is we shouldn't look at this as
some sort of a major win. It's not. until the people are free to really truly exercise the Second
Amendment to its nth degree, the right to keep and bear arms is going to be a second-class right.
That's just all there is to it. Now, a lot of people have been saying recently that, oh,
with the appointment and the voting and the acceptance of Robert Cicada,
As the new ATF director, well, that's going to put America in a new direction and an indirection of
freedom for the right to keep and bear arms. Bull fertilizer.
I don't believe that for half a second, much less one. So this next article seems to be,
to me, more or less a tall glass of water to help us swallow the bitter pill of ATF's continuance
as an agency. I really believe that those 34 items that they seem to be relenting on and issuing
new final rules were proposed in the hope of Congress okaying their budget for fiscal year 2026 and
2027 and on through.
They know when they're feeling the heat, and they do try to make concessions,
overt and real concessions. They're platitudes. They're, oh, okay,
well, we'll be nicer and we'll be kinder and we won't be as mean to the gun industry and we'll be
more lenient. Yes, yeah. Here's the problem.
You can never forget that the ATF is a murderous criminal abomination that is constitutionally
unfit to exist, okay? It will never. be a constitutional agency.
It will never uphold and defend the supreme law, and as far as I'm concerned,
it must be eradicated, and most of its agents need to be imprisoned for,
let's say, decades at hard labor, because it doesn't matter who's at the helm.
It's an agency that exists for the sole purpose of infringing the right of the people to keep and
bear arms suitable for warfare, and to rule over the industry that produces those arms with an iron
fist. As long as there's an ATF, the right of the people to truly keep and bear arms will always be
infringed, period, full stop, end of story. Here's an article by A.W.R.
Hawkins, and it's titled, ATF Director Robert Cicada,
colon, colon. A hunter, AR-15 owner, and fan of an armed citizenry.
Are you, sir? To what degree? If I come pulling up in front of ATF headquarters in a Bradley
fighting vehicle with a minigun mounted on top of it, you're okay with that?
I didn't think so. This guy's being sold to us as if he is some sort of a savior who's going to
totally reform the ATF. Bullcrap. It ain't gonna happen.
Here's the article. Breitbart News was at the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco,
Firearms and Explosives and really, really big fires when Robert Cicada was sworn in Monday and he
sat down with us afterward to talk about growing up hunting with his dad,
owning numerous AR-15s and valuing the importance of an armed citizenry.
And yet he's been working at the ATF for 21 years, huh?
If he really values an armed citizenry, what weapons, in his opinion,
should we be armed with? Hmm? AR-15s only? Now let's cue the whimsical music.
Cicada's parents immigrated from Yugoslavia, and his exposure to firearms came from his father.
who would take him target shooting and eventually along hunting trips in upstate New York.
The target shooting began in his youngest years when Cicada's dad began taking him on hunts when he
was 12 years of age. Cicada said, I had a Stevens single barrel 20 gauge shotgun that I started off
with. He had his first double barrel shotgun, which I still have.
Speaking of his father, and we started out small game hunting, rabbit, pheasant,
etc. But it was more about being out in the woods with your dad and getting out of the city and
having a good old time. He taught me how to clean a gun, how to do it safely, how to make sure that
everything I did with that firearm had safety for myself, for my father,
and others who would go hunting with us. He developed a love and respect for the things his father
passed on to him and in turn passed them on to his son. Cicada became a police officer in New York
City in 1992, at which point he quote-unquote got into handguns.
Besides expanding his horizon to include an appreciation for handguns,
Cicada noted that those early years as an officer taught him the value of an armed citizenry.
Okay, armed to what extent? He talked about meeting many of his father's friends,
noting that some were hunters and others were not, but the only thing they had in common was that,
quote, they were living in fear in New York City at the time. Well,
you ought to see the present fear levels in New York City, sir. Now, by the way,
that's something Mr. Cicada helped create by enforcing New York gun control laws.
Yeah, they're painting him as some sort of a saint here, the patron saint of the ATF.
Cicada said crime was through the roof in New York City. You got to see it now. Mayor Dinkins,
Democrat, communist, was the mayor, a very nice man, but there was no mantra to hold people
accountable for violent crime. Oh, it's far worse right now. He was assigned to Harlem where he
met, quote, Lots of great people living in really high crime areas who were happy to see cops,
of course, because they'd been disarmed, who wanted to come out there and help make the place
better. I can tell you what we never focused on during all that violence.
We never focused on holding people that were legitimate gun owners. There's no such thing in New
York anymore, sir. or federal firearms licensees responsible for what the criminals were doing.
No, that would come later in your career when you joined the ATF. Anyway, Cicada again stressed
that there were, quote, a lot of people living in fear in New York City, but it was so challenging
to get a permit to own a gun, a carry permit, or even a target permit. You had to get a permit to
go target shoot? Really? As a result, people went outside the legal framework to acquire guns.
Oh boy, could I ever run a nice rabbit trail here, but I'm not going to. Not because they were
trying to be criminals, but because they were afraid for themselves and their families.
Exactly. We the people are afraid for ourselves and our families too,
and not just from the street level thugs, but from the largest crime syndicate in America today,
the United States federal government. Yeah. The same fear we have,
you know, fear of that federal standing armor army that enforces these constitutionally vile laws
like the NFA and the GCA, something that your agency that you now head up,
sir, does on a daily freaking basis.
As we talked, said Mr. Hawkins, it was clear that the firsthand experience of watching hardworking
Harlem families treasure firearms for self-defense is something that remains at the forefront of
Cicada's mind and frames his view of the importance of Americans being armed.
Okay. But armed to what extent? To meet the threat of only the street criminals?
Well, what about... the threat of a violent government or violent federal government agents who
suddenly assault your compound because you have to be part of a weird religious cult or maybe just
what you're a little pawn, what should I say, gun show dealer like Mr.
Malinowski was. What about his right to defend himself and his wife against the thugs of your
agency, sir? And you were part of the agency when that happened,
just like you were part of the agency during Fast and Furious. You've been there for 21 years.
Cicada worked as a police officer. I'm sorry. Cicada's work as a police officer led him.
led to him being part of a team, working in partnership with the ATF,
and eventually working for the ATF itself. He has been with the ATF for 21 years,
in other words, since 2004. Okay, you said you saw these hardworking families who just wanted to be
armed to defend themselves, but yet you worked in partnership with the ATF.
Okay, please explain this to me. Why would you do that? Why would you work in partnership with the
ATF when the ATF is the agency that comes down hard and heavy booted upon people who are just
simply who own guns outside the law or who sought to find guns outside of normal legal channels,
as you talked about earlier? Oh, wow.
He pointed out that he saw change in the ATF over time. We saw it long before that,
sir. A change so great that Cicada, quote, was actually called out in a meeting and told that he
should be ashamed because he owned AR-15s. Yeah,
so in a meeting of the ATF, allegedly some ATF higher up told him he should be ashamed because he
owned an AR-15 or multiple. Cicada said, quote, I laughed in response because that was the only
option I had because this person who said this to me was an executive here at ATF.
And they said it was because of me and people like me that their children go through active shooter
training at schools. Okay, if what he says is true, then now you understand the mindset of these
filthy, nasty, godless ATF swine. Most of these people he's talking about are still there.
This is how they think about you and I. You understand now? He's now the head of this agency.
What kind of change do you think he's going to be able to make? You think he's going to change all
of their minds and their mindsets and their habits and the way they do things there?
Not a chance, baby.
He said he did not know what... What to say because the criticism of his AR-15 ownership came at a
time when he had been in law enforcement for nearly 30 years. Why didn't you speak up?
Why didn't you say, what are you talking about? How dare you talk to me like that? How dare you
talk about me like that? If I was you, Mr. Cicada, I'd have said, hey, jackasses, we carry these
guns in the commission of our duties. How dare we? assume that the people cannot own these guns
too. No, you didn't have to spine for that, did you? Oh, Royce,
you just said that. Oh, you bet your backside I would have. You ask anybody that knows me. Ask the
people that work around me. I have no filter whatsoever. Things need to be said.
Even if they're hard things, they get said. Because I've seen what silence does.
Silence in the face of abuse. does nothing but help the abuser,
not the abused. Yeah. Why didn't you speak up, Mr.
Cicada? You don't have the testicular fortitude? He told Breitbart News,
quote, I had been risking my life in cities all over the country to keep their community and other
communities safe. Well, why didn't you just let them risk their own lives and get out of their way
and let them keep and bear arms? You wouldn't have had such a hard job. He said,
but the officials were willing to wrap me up with violent offenders, in other words, equate me with
violent offenders and say I should be ashamed of myself. Well, that's what they've been doing to
all peaceable gun owners since 1934. Sir, they've been equating us with gangsters in order to
justify taking arms for war from our possession. He made clear,
he said, I don't want anyone judging me based on the firearm that I own and associating me with
criminal conduct because of it. Well, sir, that's what you and your fellow ATF agents have been
doing to us with your enforcement of the NFA and the GCA.
By your association with the ATF, you...
have treated us as untrustworthy to own weapons of warfare while you and your fellow agents have
carried them freely. But you try to tell us what we can and cannot own. You want to point to this
higher up above you that tried to shame you about owning a mere AR-15? What have you been doing to
us?
He pushed back against the pistol stabilizer brace rule when it began being floated within the ATF,
and he told us, The entire leadership team that is here at the ATF with me now was pushing back on
the administration back then, saying this is not the area that we should be focused on,
but we weren't in a position to be able to stop it. We're stopping it now,
okay? If you weren't in a position back then when you were a member of the ATF,
how are you in a position to stop it now? while you're a member of the ATF.
Make this make sense. How are you going to stop it, by the way? Why don't you answer this
truthfully, sir? What area of the firearms business have you then been focused on if you say you're
not focusing on this now? Why did you continue to enforce it if it was so repugnant to you?
Why is it so acceptable for you, for decent, peaceable citizens to go to prison?
for violating these laws so you could keep your freaking job and stay quiet. And why did you assist
in enforcing Biden's zero tolerance policies against the gun industry,
sir? You were there the whole freaking time. Oh, but now I'm in a position I can do something about
it. Well, because you're at the top. What happens when the next guy takes over?
This is not just a question of leadership. It's a question of moral rot.
in your agency constitutional ignorance constitutional dyslexia i might even say he added we're not
spending our time on the things that someone wants to demonize we're focused on the people that are
actually committing crimes with a firearm not the firearm itself it's the person that is committing
the crime if that's true sir Why is Patrick Adamiak still in prison,
and why is not Agent Jeffrey Bodell in prison for fabricating the evidence that convicted him?
You are at the top. Are you going to do something about that? Yeah,
that was a rhetorical question. Mr. Hawkins said, As our time came to a close,
we asked Cicada if there was one central thing he would like to communicate to gun owners,
and he responded, quote, I would tell the American gun owner to understand that ATF is in your
corner.
Lord, please refrain my tongue right now because I want to say bullshit so badly.
The ATF has never been in our corner, nor will it ever be.
Then he added, insultingly, we are here supporting the Constitution.
No, sir, you are not.
would not exist if the Constitution was truly being implemented and enforced throughout the land.
We're here supporting the Constitution, and I will tell you who needs to worry about the ATF.
The criminals, the gang members, the cartel members, the transnational crime members.
That's a little late for Patrick Adamiak, isn't it? A little late for Brian Malinowski.
A little late for those 89 people that were burned to death in Waco. A little late for Randy Weaver
and his family. A little late for all of those FFLs that you,
sir, helped put out of business during Biden's fraudulent administration. Oh,
but now you're on the right side. And ATF is going to be the kinder, gentler ATF now.
Yeah, the ATF is now our BFF. Yeah, we're gonna get shirts made and everything We're gonna have gun
owners holding hands with ATF agents walking down the street and singing kumbaya together Yeah The
criminals and the gang members and the cartel members, they're the ones that need to worry about us
Well, they weren't too worried about y'all when you were trafficking guns to them, were they?
And to those criminals, gang members, cartel members, and transnational crime members, ATF is
coming after you with the full force of the government. Why?
To traffic more guns to them? You know, I'm sorry. I don't have any trust for you,
Mr. Cicada. You or anybody else that wears a badge with the three initials ATF on them.
The only way that you will ever truly regain my trust is if you tell me I'm going to do my best to
totally burn down this agency around me to where I'm the last guy walking out the door before this
thing blows up behind me and we are going to enforce the Constitution. But that will never happen.
It will never be the kinder, gentler ATF. I don't care who's at the helm.
It just ain't. going to happen because the agency has no right to exist at all.
You see, there shouldn't be a DOJ enforcing the Second Amendment against the city of Denver.
There shouldn't be a DOJ lawsuit against them for banning AR-15s.
None of this should have happened. Where did the government decide to pull up its stakes from the
Constitution and begin to circumvent it. Because what I fear is we're reading this now,
and everybody's going to look at this if the Supreme Court does eventually,
like Harmeet Dillon says, declare that AR-15s are legal all over the country. We're going to look
at that as a win without understanding all the losses that have brought us to that point.
And that saddens me because we are so far removed from a constitutional fitting footing.
I'm sorry. And that's why I say you should stay in contact with your reps. Stay armed up.
Stay trained up. Stay loud. Stay proud. And never forget, incoming rounds always have the right of
way. Royce out.