Gohmert: Fast and Furious shows gun control should start with administration

By Pete Kasperowicz - 01/15/13 11:04 PM ET

Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-Texas) said Tuesday that if the President Obama wants to impose new restrictions on gun ownership, he should start with his own administration, given how it handled the Fast and Furious gun-walking operation.

"[W]e have a president who makes speeches and an attorney general that makes speeches about how they're going to go after illegal gun sales, and yet there is blood on the hands of people in this administration, and we can't even find out who they are," Gohmert said on the House floor Tuesday night.

Gohmert referenced the Fast and Furious operation indirectly, by noting that the Obama administration instructed gun dealers to sell guns to illegally, and promised to track those guns as they made their way to criminals. Some of the guns that were "walked" were eventually found where U.S. Border Agent Brian Terry was killed in 2010.

"The guns were not followed," he said. "They made their way into criminals' hands, as was intended, but they weren't followed.

"And now the administration says they want to support the rule of law and go after these illegal gun sales? Well, they have to start with their own administration."

Gohmert, in his first extended floor remarks of the 113th Congress, broadly criticized the Obama administration for flouting the rule of law. For example, Gohmert said Obama has failed four times to deliver a budget proposal to Congress on time.

He also criticized Obama for saying he would not negotiate with Republicans on ways to reduce the deficit in the context of trying to increase the debt ceiling, and for saying these issues have never been linked before. But Gohmert said spending cuts and the debt ceiling have been linked several times, including in 2010, when Democrats were in charge of Congress.

"The president needs to have somebody around him that knows the truth," Gohmert said. "That poor man is being lied to."

"The president doesn't even remember two years ago," Gohmert added. "Somebody has got to help this poor man understand recent and distant history."