WASHINGTON — The Senate narrowly confirmed on Tuesday that Steven M. Dettelbach heads the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives, making the agency responsible for drafting the federal response to gun violence its first permanent leader in seven years.
Mr Dettelbach, a former Ohio federal prosecutor, was confirmed by a… 48-to-46 votes† He was supported by every Democrat who voted, as well as two Republicans, Susan Collins of Maine and Rob Portman of Ohio.
The confirmation of Mr. Dettelbach, 57, who was President Biden’s second choice for the job, marked a victory for the White House, which has sought to address an increase in gun-related crime and mass shootings without the use of universal background checks and a ban on assault weapons are the preferred policy tools.
West Wing officials considered Mr Dettelbach’s confirmation as important, at least in the short term, as the modest two-pronged gun control measure adopted by Congress and signed into law by the president last month.
Mr. Dettelbach was expected to be sworn in shortly after the vote so he could begin the daunting task of activating an agency grappling with an overwhelming workload, unrelenting opposition from the US gun lobby, technological constraints, a sagging morale and chronic funding shortfalls that have left field offices a shortage of personnel needed to investigate crimes and inspect arms dealers.
“He faces a very big task,” said Senator Angus King, a Maine political independent who caucuses with Democrats and last year. the nomination scuttled Biden’s first choice to head the agency, David Chipman, over concerns about his fiery temper.
“Dettelbach’s first task, and he has accomplished it by just being confirmed, is to improve morale at ATF after nearly eight years without anyone at the helm,” added Mr King after casting his vote for Mr Dettelbach had released. “The second task is to find the right people at the top to carry out what he wants to achieve. It is a reconstruction exercise.”
John Feinblatt, the chairman of Everytown for Gun Safety, a group funded by former New York City Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg, called the Senate vote “a turning point victory for the gun safety movement and further evidence that the Senate has a blockade around this life or death question is finally breaking through.”
Initially vehement opposition to Mr Dettelbach’s confirmation subsided after the recent mass shootings in Buffalo; Uvalde, Texas; and Highland Park, Illinois, called for action in Washington. Democratic leaders had to resort to a procedural move last month to break a deadlock in the Judiciary Committee, but while most Republicans opposed the choice, they did so without much vehemence.
“There were questions about his track record, but I agree that the ATF definitely needs a permanent leader,” Missouri Republican Senator Roy Blunt said after voting against the nomination on Tuesday.
A graduate of Harvard Law School, Mr. Dettelbach worked in a series of attorneys in Maryland, Washington, DC and Ohio before becoming the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Ohio, which includes Cleveland. He held that position under President Barack Obama and served from 2009 to 2016.
Since the spring, he’s been quietly working on the phones to assure agency supporters that he appreciated their hard work during his under-the-radar nomination process, earning him the quiet backing of career officials hostile to Mr. chipman.
mr. Dettelbach ran unsuccessfully for Ohio’s attorney general as a Democrat in 2018, but he went to great lengths to publicly portray himself as a career prosecutor who believes politics “plays no part in law enforcement,” as he put it at his hearing. That stance was meant to contrast with Mr. Chipman, whose searing criticism of Republicans and gun rights groups had sparked a backlash that eventually forced the administration to revoke his nomination.
The bureau that Mr. Dettelbach inherits has long been crippled by a series of laws passed at the behest of the National Rifle Association and other gun rights advocacy groups that have limited the agency’s ability to conduct electronic gun traces or collect basic firearms data. share with the public.
But the agency is playing an outrageous role in enacting nearly all of the gun-control measures Mr Biden has taken through the executive branch — including a crackdown on the sale of homemade “ghost guns” and the government’s promise to monitor federally licensed arms dealers more closely. investigations, which are often the source of weapons used in crimes.
In addition, the agency is expected to be a key player in enacting the new gun law, especially provisions included in the bill that make it easier for prosecutors to file federal gun trafficking charges.
“It comes at the right time and it’s important for him to get to work now,” said New York Democrat Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, who worked on the human trafficking provisions. “I want them to bring human trafficking cases every day.”
Mr. Dettelbach’s path to his new job was elliptical. Justice Department officials, stung by Mr Chipman’s demise, were skeptical about announcing a new candidate to become the agency’s permanent director. Instead, they preferred to continue the tenure of the agency’s interim director, Marvin Richardson, a careers bureau officer.
But after The New York Times reported that Mr. Richardson… attended an arms industry sponsored event in Las Vegas, under pressure from gun control groups, White House officials began a search for less polarizing potential candidates.
They chose Mr. Dettelbach, who was well-liked within the Department of Justice and was seeking a new job after unsuccessfully trying to be reappointed to his old position as a US attorney in northern Ohio.
Some gun control activists initially questioned whether Mr. Dettelbach, known for his pleasant, low-key personality, would be strong enough to overhaul the agency. But on Tuesday their response was festive, albeit a little dampened by the challenges he faces.
†This is a historic day† said Josh Scharff, senior adviser in the legal branch of Brady, a gun safety group that pressured the White House to elect a permanent director.
Mr Scharff said he hoped Mr Dettelbach would quickly implement changes needed to reduce the arms trade and improve the agency’s oversight of the arms industry.
“He will be an outstanding leader of ATF and will rapidly and effectively modernize ATF to catalyze the agency’s public security mission,” he added.