Todd Interview 2

On today's follow-up to last time, Todd continues to discuss his experiences as a career ATF Agent.  We discuss leadership, various federal agency cultures, and how to improve the applicant pool and those hired.

Thanks again to Todd for agreeing to speak with me, and I look forward to next week's episode where we dive into various high-profile ATF incidents and expose the BS in some conspiracy theories.

See you Tuesday!

-LEO

Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:06

So we you know, we were looking at trying to get this guy kind of hemmed up because he was a multi-convicted felon, been involved in moving a lot of dope and guns. And anyway, we st we stopped this guy, get him shut down, no firearm, but start patting him down, and then lo and behold, what do we find in his pocket? Two bullets. Those two bullets, because of the 922 G1, we hit him with a felon in possession. He got 20 years. So he got 10 years per bullet. And so we were able to pick this guy up and uh, you know, charge him criminally with that. So, I mean, there's there's things out there, I think a lot of the local law enforcement and and state law enforcement that do not realize that that they have available to them that can be used to hem these guys up or put them away. If they're a true thorn in the side of their communities or whatever, there's there's a means to get these guys off of the street.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

And that's you know, to follow up on that, I think it would be easy. I'm I'm guessing there were some eye rolls when people are like 10 years per bullet. What a crock of shit. But you don't get that unless you are a many time convicted violent felon. You don't get looked at by ATF unless you are an active violent criminal.

SPEAKER_01 1:30

Yeah. If it was anybody, any Joe Schmoe or whatever, some regular citizen, I don't care. I don't care if you're walking around the whole freaking 50-round box of ammunition. I don't, who cares? But it was the the focus on this was to deal with this guy because he was involved in in running a lot of dope and had been involved in shootings previously.

SPEAKER_00 1:55

And he was almost smart enough to get away with it, but not quite.

SPEAKER_01 2:00

Yes. You know, he thought he was smart enough. Like I said, there was no gun there, but he had the two rounds of ammunition, and that's what ultimately did him in. And of course, then then the whole story, well, those aren't my pants. It's like, dude, you're wearing them. And it's like, how do you say that they're not your pants when they fit you just like they should?

SPEAKER_00 2:18

It doesn't work, man. They're not a loner. Uh man, I I had one very similar where the guy had set up a murder, set up his friend to be killed, and went to interview him and uh was in his bedroom, and there was an empty holster sitting on the night. There's a gang member, he's involved in all kinds of stuff since he's young, and empty holster sitting there. And so, you know, I went through a suppression hearing because of this, but it was me and one other ATF agent in the room and this guy. And I said, Hey, is it all right with you? If I handcuff you, I'm a little concerned about that empty holster. And he was like, No, that's fine, there's no gun in here, blah, blah, blah. So I handcuffed him, which they questioned on it being a valid consent. They said that he was in custody. It was found that he was not, because I said, I'm not arresting you. I'm just a little nervous because I don't want to fight over a gun. Yeah. And found bullets, same thing. Didn't find a gun. He told us he'd had one, but he'd sold it or something. And maybe I missed it. I have no idea. But he got time over that. And but he wasn't just a guy. He wasn't just a witness that we caught up. He his answers made no sense. They weren't able to charge him with murder. They knew he didn't pull the trigger. They believed he'd set it up and timed it and done all this stuff, but he was essential in that murder. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 3:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:40

There's got some time.

SPEAKER_01 3:42

And and that's the beauty of having the availability to pull guys in from an agency like ATF because guys that are who have that expertise in dealing with violent crime. And that that's a that's an expertise only that comes about from experience and then doing it for a number of years. When you get these other agencies, and I worked a whole lot with the DEA. You know, again, drugs and guns go hand in hand, and we were constantly helping one another out. Whereas the other agencies not so much, because there was that, you know, effort to to kind of hijack the whole case. Yep.

SPEAKER_00 4:25

And so And there's a weird stinginess with information, despite everybody knowing 9-11 happened because of that. People are still like, what are you gonna tell me? And I'm not really gonna tell you anything in certain in certain agencies. And I hesitate. I know some great agents in every agency, but some of the cultures overall are not, I think.

SPEAKER_01 4:51

That's very true. You know, I I I'm not going to name the agencies.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

You can now. You're retired.

SPEAKER_01 5:00

Well, that's true. I am. You know, there there was I did some and still do. I still do some work around the world in different countries. And one of the guys I was working with was one with one of those agencies. I'll go ahead and name it FBI. And he uh, you know, he he had the typical FBI attitude. Well, everybody he made this comment. Everybody knows that the FBI is the greatest law enforcement agency in the world. He actually said that? Oh, yeah. Verbatim. Come on. That's exactly what he said. And I looked at him like that. So I'm so brainwashed. Don't do that. Well, I my head spun around. I'm going, dude, you really you guys really do drink your Kool-Aid, don't you? Yeah, and who's everybody?

SPEAKER_00 5:46

Don't want me in, brother.

SPEAKER_01 5:47

Yeah, I'm just like, wow. You know, and that just the the typical arrogance. And there is those, I think you alluded to it earlier, there, there is those turf battles within the federal agencies because everybody's trying to get their protect their kingdom.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:07

You know, and that and they're probably one of the worst out there that that tries to go in and steal cases. I had, matter of fact, I had a case that was stolen from them that that got pretty hostile. It got a little heated, I will say that. And and I had another a buddy of mine who he was actually shot and killed, but he was DEA, and he had one of his cases that that same agency, they they were trying, they were going after the same target, the same individual. And so they ended up, because they didn't have quite the the evidence for the problem caused to go forward with any further investigation, they ended up subpoenaing the DEA agent and using his testimony in the grand jury to go after the this target of his. And they just they you what they did is they ended up hijacking his case completely out from underneath him. But that's that's normal, I mean, for that one particular outfit.

SPEAKER_00 7:08

So it's a damn shame. And I I'm gonna lump a lot of agencies in with this next comment. And I mean, I started seeing it as a new local cop when you could put, you know, the arresting officer writes the report and you could put an assisting officer. Uh, you know, there was a tab for that. And then I know you were probably writing paper reports, but I started on a computer. Um throw a little shade on you. But and there were officers that would be like, hey, put me as assisting. Like they got there after I had them in custody, but they wanted the stat because the computer generated that as an arrest for them. Yeah. And then I've heard the word stat used as a verb, which is disgusting, where they're like, oh, just kind of piggyback, like go to the meeting occasionally and you can stat that. Like you can claim that arrest. And I'm like, wait, you want me to not be involved in the case, but grab the number?

SPEAKER_01 8:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:05

No.

SPEAKER_01 8:05

Yeah, no, that's I'm not doing that. We didn't work that way. And as you know, but we just, you know, we tried to do the right thing. And and again, that's why we got along so well with our local counterparts, is because if they needed help, it's like you said, what do you need? What can I do to help you?

SPEAKER_00 8:23

Kind of like a good we were talking about supervision, kind of like a good supervisor should maybe be. Like instead of the iron fist, like, what can I do to help? You look like you got something to say.

SPEAKER_01 8:34

Well, I've got a whole lot to say on this one. You know, I will say this. I had there are a few good supervisors, and I would call them leaders. The others that I had were managers. And that's in my personal opinion, there's a huge dichotomy there. There's a big difference there between a true leader as a supervisor and somebody who is just a manager. Yeah. Because they really don't care. They don't care for their people. And I think somebody who is a true leader, a good uh a good boss, is there to help you in any way that you need. Matter of fact, the my very first my very first supervisor in ATF, he told me, he's like, I'm not gonna get in your way. That's not my job. You're hired to do a job, you obviously know how to do the job, go out there and do it. Now, if you need anything to do your job better, then let me know. And I'll get either the funding for it or we'll get you whatever you need to help you do your job better. But otherwise, I don't want to see you. I don't want to see your your butt sitting in the office, I want to see you out there working. And so I did. Now, was that the case for everybody? No. There was a more times than not, you see guys that would go in there and want to gossip or talk or God knows what. But but anyway, those those good true leaders were very few and far between. And there's many instances, even in cases that I know were guys that were not too often long ago that that retired and and the manner in which they were they were retiring is a fact of what was under post-traumatic stress issues. Issues that they dealt with on the job, dealing with death, and I mean everybody deals with it differently. That's a whole other topic we can talk about. But but but I know these guys just awesome agents and did great work, but because they were they were suffering and the agency didn't help them, they were chastised, ostracized, treated poorly, and it's just like you know what, you don't do that to your people.

SPEAKER_00 11:04

Serve your people.

SPEAKER_01 11:06

Exactly.

SPEAKER_00 11:07

Treat them like you would want to be treated. I know that's cliche, but like, what if you were the one actually doing the job and picking up the bodies and doing the shootings? You don't know how you'd feel. Maybe you'd want help.

SPEAKER_02 11:19

Yeah.

unknown 11:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:21

And wanting help, you don't always react well to stuff. You know, I'm not saying put on kid gloves, but they're not gonna be like, hey, boss, I need some help. Can you get me a counselor? Like, you might have to lead that conversation.

SPEAKER_01 11:33

Yes. And there's typically going to be things manifested, there's going to be certain telltale signs that people are going through and struggling with certain things in their career that they had a hard time with. I mean, I I had, I'm be perfectly honest, I mean, there are some things that I dealt with in my career over 32 years that I had a hard time with. And everybody deals with stress differently, too, trauma. I got I was involved in a shooting. I was shot in 1987, had two years on the job, been shot at multiple times, and then the bombing in Oklahoma City, and then dealing with that, and the loss there, and almost losing my wife and youngest daughter. But you all of that stuff is cumulative.

SPEAKER_02 12:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 12:23

And then over a period of time, and especially I think whenever one retires, when you retire, you've got all this extra time. And now all those things that you went through in your career starts to come back to the surface. But I digress. The the guys that I know, because they were going out on that particular type of retirement, I mean, they were treated very poorly. And that's that's not a leader. But, you know, that that's unfortunate that we've got those type of people in those positions.

SPEAKER_00 12:55

Um I think every big organization deals with that, honestly. I d I don't know any organization over. I mean, I'll go low, like 40 people that doesn't have problems in the management chain. You get over a couple thousand.

SPEAKER_01 13:11

Very true. You know, and then we start talking about the leadership, the the I call good old boy system, guys that were pre-selected for positions, which that that happened. You know, I could not even name names on that one. But there are people who were pre-selected for positions in ATF that should not have got those positions. And I know for a fact that they were they were pre-selected for it. So But it's, you know, again, you you deal with mankind, you deal with humans in general. There's gonna be those who, you know, don't always do the right thing. Always. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:52

Let me ask you this. Do you know David King with the Marshall Service? He's a retired chief. That name sounds He was the chief of basic training back in the day. Okay. He may have been over it when you were there. He he was our admin when I was on the Marshall Task Force on Certif. And we had like a 66-year-old lady that was super sweet, and then she retired, and we got like this recently retired chief. He was a UDT in Vietnam. So, like what before pre-SEAL, he did that in Vietnam. And then he got in the Marshal Service. His so he was our admin, and I promoted to be a sergeant on the police department off of the Marshall Task Force. I swear this has something to do with what you were talking about. He always prided himself. He wasn't a huge talker, but you could tell he'd done the job. He wasn't a shit bag who made it to chief. He had done it just from talking to him. And he got along with everybody in the office, which I mean, we had 12 guys from different age from different state and local agencies. Yeah. Everybody doesn't get along. I mean, it's strong personalities, stuff happens. You butt heads in an after-action review. You there, you butt heads about somebody did something stupid on an entry and left them exposed. No, whatever. It has somebody misses a pin, misses a block, and you're like, you put my fucking life in danger. You can't block a car. Yeah. Stuff happens. But David got along with everybody, and or Chief, as I called him. Well, he, when I was getting ready to promote, I was like, man, I'm going back to patrol. I don't even remember how to patrol. Like I was in narcotics and swab. Like I spent not a lot of time on patrol. Like, how am I going to manage? Like, we make violent crime scenes over here. We don't supervise them. So we make it and then turn it over to them. So I went to David one day and I was like, hey, can we talk? He's like, yeah, come on in. Said, why does everybody like you here? Because I don't, I'm about to be supervising and I don't know. I'm just trying to figure out how you did it. Like, you're a chief. I've never met a deputy marshal that has a bad word to say about you. Like, what did you do as a supervisor? And then he said, he starts talking talking about the disc assessment and personalities. He starts going through everybody in the office and how he he's like, well, this guy's a talker. So if I'm going to give him a case, I ask him how his wife and kids are. And then he summed me up aggressively, hurt my feelings, chief. And he was, he was like, I know when I give you a case, I got your ear for about three seconds. I have time to say, he's got a wife or he's got a baby mom on 35th Street. Take a look at her. And I hand you the file because I know you leave the conversation and I know you're going to read the file, but you don't really want much of my opinion. You'll take a little bit. And I was like, damn, okay, you're right. Yep. And he went through all these people's different personalities. And he said, you know, this guy is he's compliant. You know, he's a C on the disc assessment. So he's interested in numbers and charts. So I want to present him. He's going to want to go through every page and talk about phone records and details. And so he basically talked about how his way of leading, he's and he kept saying just like leadership is service. You need to serve your team. And you need, I think he quoted Schwartzkoff and was like, you know, if you're leading a platoon, you can be a good leader. But if you're leading 30 individuals, you can be the best or great or whatever he said. Yeah. And it was, it was like an epiphany. Like, man, I hit a shift to supervise 26 police officers. And it would have been easy to go, hey, here's the standard, be on time, be well groomed, take your reports appropriately, don't be rude, don't punch people that don't need punching. Don't wreck my cars, right? Yep. But it's a totally different approach to be like, hey, first day, what do you guys need? Like, what do you just like you said? What do you like? You told me the the director said to you at one point, right? Like, what do you guys need that you don't have?

SPEAKER_01 18:14

Yeah. Yeah. We, yeah, and that that conversation I know we did offline, but you know, we were we were went, we had our quarterly training for the team, that's our T team. We happened to be down in Waco. This was in 2013, and we this was the 20-year anniversary after after Waco. So we were there, we were at the Texas, Texas Ranger Hall of Fame Museum, and they had a big banquet area. We had a big lunch, it was nice. Our director came in from DC.

unknown 18:46

B.

SPEAKER_01 18:46

Todd Jones was his name. And he was a nice enough guy, but he came over there, and you recall the, I mean, the conversation that we had with him, he came over, sat down, and he's like, What do you guys need? And me being the guy who you know, you're gonna ask me a question, I'm gonna tell you my my thoughts on it. And so I told him I I didn't really care. But he said, What do you guys need? I said, We need people. Right now we're running hundreds of operations around the country, we're down in manpower, and we need another uh basic training for for team operators because everybody's just getting tired and wore out. And he immediately right after that, immediately started putting the wheels into motion to have a team basic. So we would have more team guy team guys, more operators, so it would help kind of take some of the load off of us. But that that was that's a sign of a good leader because it's it's one of those points where whether people like the guy or not, he at least, you know, one of the things I respect about him, he at least asked us as the director, what do you need to do your job? And and he did it. He put those wills into motion, he made it happen, we got some help, and that's all we could ask for.

SPEAKER_00 20:10

I think most directors in that situation are maybe giving a talk in front of the group, probably not breaking bread with the SRT members, right?

SPEAKER_02 20:20

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 20:20

They might go up and spit a little rhetoric about we're no better partner, and you know, we're uh blah, blah, blah, and you know, a generic speech. But that's totally different.

SPEAKER_01 20:32

It is, and we, you know, we were the, I guess you could say, the knuckle draggers in the agency, and and we were the guys who going out there and hitting and working in all these high-risk operations and stuff, got involved in a number of shootings there, but but he at least asked. He was a good leader, and he asked our opinion, and and he listened, like I said, and that's important. You know, we weren't asking for a whole lot, it was just, you know, get some more guys on the team because of our operation tempo was so heavy.

SPEAKER_00 21:04

My take on leadership is pretty simple.

SPEAKER_01 21:08

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 21:09

Being a leader in an organization, it doesn't make you better than anybody. No, it just means you have a different job.

SPEAKER_01 21:18

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 21:18

Like you were a knuckle dragger. Your buddy that we talked about earlier, he was the team commander. Yeah. He's he's not better than you, and he should still listen to you because you might see or know or understand something differently. Yeah. And I don't care if you're the chief of police, you still put your pants on one leg at a time. You get compensated for the difficulty of your job. Uh I don't want to be brash, but like, okay, I'm sorry your job's difficult and stressful. You took the chief of police of Chicago, like, that's going to be stressful. Yes. Yes. And guess what? The beat cop in Inglewood, Chicago is also stressful in a different way. Y'all are equal.

SPEAKER_01 21:57

Absolutely. You know, we like I like I mentioned to you, there are there are a few leaders in the agency. And there's a whole unfortunately there's more managers. I had one particular ASAC, the uh assistant special agent in charge for the whole division, number two guy, he called me up one day and he said, Hey, I've got a question for you. He said, Do you have some time to s to swing by the office? I went, Yeah. And so I I met with him and he said, I have to ask you a question. I said, Why are you asking me? He said, Because I can ask other people and they'll blow smoke up my hind end. He said, I can ask you a simple question, and you're gonna be very brutally blunt with me. And he said, That's what I want. And I'm like, Okay. And I said, Do you sure you want that? And he goes, Yeah, I do.

SPEAKER_00 22:49

I'll cry about it afterwards.

SPEAKER_01 22:51

And so he he did. He asked my opinion on something, and I gave him an answer, or at least what I thought was an answer. And you know, the man the man at least respected my opinion. Yeah. And that uh that's also the son of a good leader who won't shut his people out but will listen. It doesn't mean he has to go along with it. Yeah. Now, had he not gone along with it and made his own decision, you know what? Cool.

SPEAKER_00 23:17

Yeah, you're the boss.

SPEAKER_01 23:18

But uh yes, but at least he took the time and the opportunity to sit and ask my opinion. Yeah. And then he he was very receptive of it.

SPEAKER_00 23:28

Yeah. Uh another do you know? Do you know Brandon Harrison by any chance?

SPEAKER_01 23:34

Well, that name sounds familiar.

SPEAKER_00 23:36

He's an agent. He's been on about the same amount, he's been on about 30 years. Okay. Y'all are cut from the same cloth because he's the same kind of guy. Don't ask his opinion if you don't want it because it's it's gonna sting a little bit.

SPEAKER_01 23:47

You know, I I I think there's not enough of us like that. There's too many, too many that want to tell others what they think they want to hear. Yeah, it's gross. Um, I'm not cut that way. I, you know, and I've had guys tell me my reputation, and I don't care. I'm not saying this, you know, because I'm proud of that, but it is what it is. But guys, they know if you're gonna ask me a simple question, I'm gonna give you an honest answer. I'm not gonna blow smoke up your tail end because I'm gonna give you an honest and brutally honest answer for that.

SPEAKER_00 24:20

And it's a two-way street. Don't be an asshole and ask loaded questions, which some people also do.

SPEAKER_01 24:26

Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 24:27

The yeah. I I think maybe the the BS answers are like a coping mechanism. You know, somebody gets screwed once and gets asked by their chief or their ASAC a question and then gets burnt for it. Yes. Suddenly you're like, well, I'm not doing that. I'm just gonna be an echo chamber and a yes man because I don't want to because they can screw you. I mean, they can you have a mobility clause, right? They could move.

SPEAKER_01 24:52

And there are unfortunately, there's those type of guys in the agency. You know, I'd yeah, I've heard of one story where, you know, another one of those yes men, he he called somebody who was recently promoted. This has been a few years ago, and said, Hey, and I'm paraphrasing, he said, Hey, do you want me to be your snitch? Hmm. Yikes. And he's like, No, I don't need that, don't want that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:21

I don't want you anywhere near my team, actually. Yes. Because you're looking to start some stuff.

SPEAKER_01 25:27

Oh, yeah. And that there, there's the problem with some people, then you have to look at their motivations and so forth. So, but that goes back to the type of person. What type of person are you? Are you a a good dude, a good squared-away guy who's gonna do his business? I won't sit here and tell you that I'm perfect. And if anybody ever did say that they were perfect, I'd I'd question them. But you know, there's there's things that I think that we can take from this that we ought to utilize in our careers, even in just in general life and how we deal with people, just be a good guy, take care of your business.

SPEAKER_00 26:11

So seems like it should be pretty easy. And you know, the culture that ATF has, which I liked for the most part. It you have your outliers, but some other agencies, I don't like the culture. I go in the office and I'm like, this is not it. But ATF, at least where I was, the culture was good. And I think a lot of it goes into the hiring process, which you know, how you narrow your pool of candidates. Yeah. And one gripe that I have about ATF, and I'll say it because I don't work there anymore, and a lot of people agree with me on this. The polygraph test eliminated an unreasonable amount of excellent candidates. My basic class had 24 people. 22 were former police officers, which is great. One had been a lawyer, and then one had been in the military. The other 22 were all cops, which you I think it should be a step. Absolutely. I have friends at Atlanta police, Memphis police, Savannah police, pretty major metro departments. And my biggest issue with the poly, they're good dudes. I mean, the best people get in there. You give a sociopath a poly, he's gonna be all right. Exactly. That's true. You give a thinker a poly. I mean, when I had mine for ATF, I didn't fail it. I mean, I got the job. Sure. But am I allowed to talk about the questions they ask? Am I gonna break the rules here?

SPEAKER_01 27:55

I don't know of it being classified.

SPEAKER_00 27:57

I don't think it is. They asked a question about betrayal. I'll leave it at that. And I had had a child custody trial the week before where there had been verbal blows traded between the mother of my children and I. You can view it however you want. At some part of your soul, that feels like a betrayal. And I know there's mind games and it's just too subjective on the polygrapher, but we got really focused on that, on had I betrayed people. Yeah and like who had I screwed. And I was like, and I said before, I was like, hey, this this might be tough for me because last week I spent three days in a custody trial with nine witnesses. Like it was crazy. And the polygrapher was like, Oh, just don't focus on that, don't think about that. And I was like, I don't work like that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 28:52

Um think about it.

SPEAKER_00 28:57

How do you not? And uh, you know, the APD guy know that he failed it. I mean, just the most clean cut, honest person you could ever. I know he just got in his head. And the the Memphis police guy too. And I was like, man, I would have loved to work with these guys.

SPEAKER_02 29:13

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 29:13

So I don't know how to work around that. I don't know if it weeds out actual bad people. It seems like if you've been a cop for five to ten years and you haven't been arrested and you pull the jacket and they look good, that could be enough.

SPEAKER_01 29:29

But I've you know, I've only heard of one occasion where it it kept out a bad guy. I actually had a conversation with our polygrapher in our our division, and I was talking to him one time, we were at the range, and I I ran all of the the tactical firearms training and tactical training in general. But anyway, one of the one of the quarterly trainings I had him and we were chit-chatting, and he was telling me he didn't go any detail, but other than just that a particular individual that he gave a polygraph to was a police officer, and the officer was involved in stealing it came up in the polygraph, I guess. He was he had stolen copper wire out of houses and stuff like that, was able to turn around and sell the copper wire for hundreds of dollars, and I'm like, what really? And this guy's a he's a local officer? Wow. So he's stealing copper.

SPEAKER_00 30:37

And then he's admitting it on the polygraph test, which is kind of comical to like if you're gonna be a thief on duty, you probably don't tell another cop.

SPEAKER_01 30:46

Yeah, well, you know, obviously it kept him out of the job, but thank God but anyway, that you know, you think about the polygraph test itself, it's not as admissible as evidence in court. So I understand it's a tool or a measure that's used in weeding people out, but I think I think you're right. I think it tends to weed out some really good candidates that are overthinkers. You know, and like you said, you get a sociopath in there, they're not gonna I mean they're gonna breeze right through it.

SPEAKER_00 31:22

Oh, yeah. They probably look forward to it. They look forward to tricking the guy.

SPEAKER_01 31:26

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:27

Little game for them.

unknown 31:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

Oh man. Well, I wanna I want to do one more episode if we have time, and maybe get into some of the incidents that are high profile black eyes on ATF and maybe talk about the reality of it, which I think could possibly be the most interesting one of what we've done so far. Yeah. Because most people think of Waco and think, oh, ATF just like burnt down a village, or they think of Ruby Ridge and they're like, they're out there just like smoking dogs and wives. And you you know people that were at these incidents. Hopefully, by this point, they're not thinking you're full of crap. And obviously I don't, or we wouldn't be talking, and we can wake some people up, or at the very least, if they are not sure, get them to do some reading and pull the actual files instead of judging based off of you know, some extremist two A group that is just trying to drag ATF no matter what they do, you know?

SPEAKER_01 32:33

Exactly. Well, unlike we talked about before, I'm a very conservative guy and I'm a uh very pro two A person. Saying, you know, again, I love to shoot, love to hunt, so I I don't have a problem with that at all. But you know, I think that's a good a good point.

SPEAKER_00 32:49

All right. Well, thanks a lot. I really appreciate your time.

SPEAKER_01 32:51

Anytime, brother.