Legal gun owners don’t have to worry about federal agents taking their firearms, Attorney General Pam Bondi said during a hearing Monday about the proposed Justice Department budget for Fiscal Year 2026.
Bondi responded to concerns from Democrat members of the House Appropriations Committee regarding FBI Director Kash Patel’s ambition to merge the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives with the Drug Enforcement Administration.
In the budget for Fiscal Year 2026, President Donald Trump’s administration is proposing $1.2 billion for the ATF, which would only be a 25.7% decrease from its current $1.625 billion budget. It also suggests a $100 million cut to the DEA from its current budget of $2.6 billion to $2.5 billion.
This is part of the Trump administration’s plan to reduce the size of the federal government and make it more efficient.
Rep. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., said it’s a “bad proposal.”
“You’re going to merge the two agencies together, and then you’re going to shortchange their resources,” DeLauro said. “So, neither one of them will be able to do the job that they have been designed to do.”
Bondi said merging the two bodies will increase government efficiency as “guns and drugs go together.”
“We will not be having ATF agents go to the doors of gun owners, in the middle of the night, asking them about their guns, period,” Bondi told DeLauro. “They will be out on the streets with the DEA.”
