From ATF Director to CSO of The Met: Regina Lombardo’s Inspiring Career

How does a woman in a male-dominated industry become the Director of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) and later Chief Security Officer of The Met? 

By never questioning her ability to lead. Listen as Regina Lombardo shares her journey starting in a restaurant in New York City cutting salami to becoming a career ATF agent. She discusses the challenges she faced as a woman in a male-dominated field and the importance of having mentors and a supportive network. 

Lombardo emphasizes the importance of representation and mentoring for women in federal law enforcement and shares her personal experiences and passion for supporting others through her involvement in Women in Federal Law Enforcement (WIFLE). 

Lombardo also talks about the transition from the ATF to the Treasury Department to the Department of Justice and the controversies surrounding the agency. She reflects on her time as the ATF Director and the challenges and rewards of the position. 

Listen to the end to hear Regina discuss her latest transition to her current role as the Chief Security Officer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City and the challenges and responsibilities that come with it — including dealing with the Kardashians.

Fed Time Stories is brought to you by Kaseware, an investigative case management solution. Learn more at www.kaseware.com/fedtimestoriespodcast

Transcript

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Hello everybody and welcome to another episode of FedTime Stories. We are your hosts, Dave Brant and John Gill with Kaseware. Dave and I come to you with over 35 years of experience in the public safety and security field. And we are excited to share insights and inspiration from our time in public safety, as well as the variety of guests that we host. Speaking of that, I'll turn it over to you, Dave, to introduce today's guest. Thanks, John. And as John mentioned, he and I have a fairly lengthy history in the federal law enforcement community. And it's a thrill to introduce our guest today, a fellow Fed special agent who's had a very unique and illustrious career, Regina Lombardo. And I'm just going to start right there, Regina. For the intro, you're a career ATF agent who reached the highest pinnacle of that agency. You've transitioned into the chief security officer of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. But I want to start with you. How did you get from the restaurant in New York City and to ATF? Let's hear a little bit about that story and we'll go from Well, Dave, thank you and John, I appreciate today. It's been, it's a pleasure to chat with you, but I have to say what got me to ATF was an unorthodox way of getting there actually. Basically grew up in the food industry, no one in my family, you know, in many generations were in law enforcement. So for me, I kind of realized it was more to life than slicing salami and making bread and You know, education, you know, my family was big. My parents are from Italy. They're Italian immigrants and they pushed education and pushed for me to always, you know, I say, you know, keep going and make sure that you give 100 % of whatever career and whatever job that you choose to do. For whatever reason, next thing I realized I was at the Federal Law Enforcement Training Center, I was an intern at FLETC where we all trained. And it was at FLETC that I wanted to see what federal agencies, John, I could tell you that looked at Secret Service. looked at a couple other agencies. And I must say that while I was, actually, yes, I have to say that I had, while I was an intern, had half the class was NCIS and half the class was legacy customs. And between the two, Secret Service, Marshall's, I have to say I watched the way the instructors train, I watched the way ATF agents trained. I watched how focused they were, very mission driven. And when I saw them running cadence, I asked the instructors, who are they? What do they do? And he said, those are ATF agents. And I never heard of the agency before, but I knew that they had a very vital mission. I knew that there was not a lot of women in the organization that was attracted to really work in guns and bombs, right? So. It was motivated by challenge, always have been. And it was something that I thought sounded like a pretty cool job. And the rest is sort of like what you hear as many. You apply, you try, golf war at the time was happening, so there wasn't a lot of hiring. And I have to thank the Secret Service for hiring because at the time, Secret Service, we were all treasury. Secret Service had some there was a funding pot that was there that wasn't used by the Secret Service at the time. And they sent it over to ATF and said, hire 48 agents. We hadn't hired for many, many years. It right before Waco. And so, you know, at that time, early 90s, was the most amazing time of my life, I must say. Once I was through the system, got on with ATF, I was assigned to the Miami field office, which was absolutely phenomenal. I have to say it was never a career that I had even thought about. It was really mentors in my life, people that I met, customers in my store that used to tell my mom, your daughter needs to go back to college, finish school. And it was people that I just met along the way. that just saw something in myself and that I at the time really didn't know where I wanted my life to go. But I was on my way to law school and I took a detour and I'm glad I did. I have no regrets. And like I said, that was. sort of the transition of getting on to federal government is just from really people that I've met and educated me and shared. And next thing I knew I was finished, got my badge, my gun, and I was off to the Miami field office. And it was a pretty phenomenal time, the early 90s. going to age myself, but I'm going to go back a little bit to one, I'll forgive your complete near complete dismissal of NCIS and focus on Secret Service and ATF, but we can come back to that. But two, you know, I was a police officer in Miami in the late seventies and it was, I know going into when you were there with ATF had to be an exciting time. And I became an NCIS agent from that experience, going from Miami to Virginia Beach. But what I was really going to go back to was Is the restaurant still in business? And what did your parents think? Because we'll touch on this. You probably know this better than many. You were an anomaly. ATF is not known real well during those years, and particularly for a female. All of us, Secret Service, NCIS, FBI, DA, all were late hiring females in those years. So A, how'd the restaurant do? And did you ever look at the restaurant and be what your of course. So my parents have absolutely was supportive. I must say, being Italian, they were very supportive, did not understand at all what ATF did. But it was very difficult because I actually was sort of the glue, the last of four children that was working six, seven days a week. I was running the business. And so it was hard to leave. It was a guilt. It was this, do I leave my parents' business? But it was a challenge. That was the first biggest challenge of my life is separating from that enmeshed family. at the, I must say, the restaurant here that I started, I opened my parents' business We have one in East Harlem, 115th Street. And then I opened up in 1983, an Italian pizzeria, which I was at last night, by the way, Delizia Pizzeria. And I still go in and I still, I opened up their restaurant for them. And so I always had my hand in it. And today I always think, wow, I would love to go back to the biggest responsibility was, you don't burn the bread or how do you want your salami sliced thinner, you know, thinner thick. So. after being the director of ATF, dealing with the most craziest situations, active shooting situations, critical incident, and I yearned for the day that I was gonna be making pizza and slicing salami again. it's still, 1983 was opened, one of the restaurants I've worked at and my family business since, my parents have. My mom's still alive, my parents have since, we sold everything. And I have to say, for Italians, they were very super supportive of a career. I'm very, very proud. Still, didn't quite know everything I was doing, but I kept them in the loop enough. That's nice of you. story. know all of us from comparable careers, most of our families, unless you grew up around someone in your family who was in law enforcement, never quite understood whether it was ATF, probably whether it Secret Service, and NCIS's case. must have gotten asked any kind of anybody would see me. They'd want to know why aren't you wearing a uniform because you're in the Navy. I'd go, I'm not in the Navy. What do you do? So every one of us has had that journey where end up someplace doing work that most of your support mechanism as a younger adult doesn't even understand what you're doing. And ATF in particular, most people I'd say even today, although much better highlighted, I think, in the criticality of their mission. A lot of people just didn't know much about ATF. So talk to us a little bit about those early years and I'll focus on it. As a woman in an environment that's probably majority men with a very tough mission that you probably weren't ready for necessarily from your prior lifestyle. How was Once I got to the Miami office, I found that it was very strange from growing up in East Harlem, then I moved to South Florida, and then going to Miami and walking into an ATF office for the first time, having my OJT, my on the job trainer, Bobby Smarne, guy from New York, picking me up to bring me into the office, everything was very unfamiliar, right? I felt like I was excited, but I felt a little bit unsure. And I think within a week, I was Gina from Brooklyn doing an undercover operation of an exchange of guns for 10 kilos of coke. And in my mind, I To me, it was fun. It was like, oh, this is great. I get to dress up. was doing, at the time, you know, Miami was, you know, the guns and bombs, guns and drugs capital of the world back in 1990, 91, 92. And so I walked into a very fun kind of, I didn't see it as a dangerous situation. I'm thinking, you know, I did undercover work. I, you know, I got to work with an amazing group. Jamie Higgins was somebody I met. who you both know very well. And that was the funnest times, but it was challenging. I grew up in East Harlem, so I kind of had a little bit of an edge. I kind of didn't take anything from anybody. But I learned and I listened and I watched those who I valued and looked up to, whether they were really good undercover agents or great investigators that put the massive cases together. And I aligned myself with them because that is who I wanted to grow to be. And I think that being a woman, at the time I was young, I was my 20s, late 20s, I had a couple of tough times with showing my value or showing my worth, but not in a way that I felt that it would prevent me from still leaning in and still, you know, still showing up every day. I think for the most part what saved me was I surrounded myself by a good group of men, not a lot of women, and my OJT was a guy that was from New York that we kind of hung out, we spoke the same language, he got me. I learned a lot about undercover from him, how to deal with undercover operations, but also how to deal with informants and how to do investigations. These were legacy guys that were on for 20 years before me. And so I aligned myself with the right people and I had some good group of women in the organization because we were a handful. And I think that I had this insulation of good people that I feel really guided me and really led me and didn't have me go down a bad road or feel that I didn't kind of earn my way. And I think doing the undercover work and the cases that I worked in the investigations was really what made my work ethic and my career, I would say, had a really solid foundation. So was pretty fortunate. Didn't meet a lot resistance. And if I did, I think I just blew right past it. And it wasn't gonna let anybody knock me down kind of thing. I think that when I hear that, particularly the undercover part, Regina, mean, there's nothing like doing undercover to gain the credibility from your fellow workers, right? I mean, it's probably the most dangerous thing that an investigator can do. I'm sure there's a lot of great stories. Thinking back to some of the things you were saying at the outset and a couple of things that I picked out that were threads that we're seeing throughout all these conversations with folks that typically it's not the career that you were initially interested in, right? That wasn't part of your initial thinking and that. certain doors open in a particular time that led you and that people that you met had kind of helped you in that process. And then I was thinking about, it just reminded me, and I don't think about this very often, but you're right, the Secret Service and the ATF were part of the Treasury Department. And I know that for those people that had been, now obviously with DHS and ATF with the justice, You know, that was, I think, the Secret Service. And I don't know what the story was for you guys, but that there were a lot of people that were not very happy about the transition at DHS, and it wasn't the smoothest of all transitions either. And so I'm just curious about how that felt when you guys, because that was post -9 -11 for you as well, Yeah, right after that, the whole federal government restructured. always transitioned to justice. And with Treasury, we felt that we had a little bit more flexibility. We had legacy with customs. had relationships that we work cases, especially when it came to import export of weapons. We did a lot with customs and with Secret Service, we still did the presidential details when there was a shortage, right? So when that happened, we had to really become focused on vital mission of, you know, by the crime reduction, enforcing the gun laws. became very much part of the justice, you know, their agenda. and now working for the, you know, the deputy attorney, the attorney general, everything kind of kind of changed. So we had whole transitions teams try to figure out, you know, what is, you know, what, what our, our main focus was, which became, you know, violent crime organization. Then they wanted to change the name. went through that with ATF, you know, so we, went through an impossible names change. I've been able to be part of that transition. of getting fully ingrated into justice. And since that transition now, today it's almost like it didn't exist back then during the Waco days. that didn't, we went through a lot of challenges with ATF. We're controversial organization. are probably the only agency that is attached to the Constitution. We enforce a law attached to the Constitution, right to bear arms, very controversial. And so it's always been a very difficult agency to wrap your head around because it's so gray, know, the right to bear arms and regulating the industry. That's probably was the biggest challenge being the ATF director is dealing with the gun industry, right? Being fair, finding those, you know, that proper striking the right balance of Second Amendment rights versus those who use firearms for the wrong reasons. But I have to say the transition into justice now has been, we're fully in great, we're fully there, we have to support the Attorney General and that's been, it feels like it's been a lifetime ago. I bet. to take you back again a little bit and then we'll get into your, when you became director as you ascended there. But you said something that, and we're supposed to be talking about transitions. don't know where Mr. Gill will take us. He kind of rambles off in different directions. But transition, you already described and for those who aren't either involved or experienced listeners who aren't federal law enforcement in terms of their histories don't know the differences in agencies. The point I'm going to make is every, you know, I don't think whatever agency you're with, whatever level of law enforcement you're with, law enforcement writ large is really the most visible form of government to the American public. So whether it's ATF, Secret Service, NCIS, DEA, FBI, there is always something in the limelight that's happening typically because of something connected to that agency's mission. And whether it's a horrible event like the 9 -11 events or someone has made a mistake or someone's made an accusation, in any of the agencies we've experienced, not only are you transitioning from where you were prior to becoming a law enforcement official, but you're transitioning constantly within that agency, adjusting to new challenges, new bosses, new political realities. And the reason I mentioned that you said something that I think is very valid for anyone listening. that's when you were describing what you did in your early years, I think you said, I listened or I learned, learned, listened, and then basically acted on that. So you had a lot of mentors and in each position we've all been, whatever the state of our agencies has been at the time, I think that learning and listening and then acting based on what you have been able gather from others is critically important because there's a constant transition. So I tied that all to transition. So within ATF, you transition from an undercover street agent handling many cases, the toughest assignments possible, the violent crime scenarios, drugs, gangs, till you start to get into the managerial executive ranks. What challenges did that present? How did that sort of impact your view of life, so to Well, I will tell you that the fun times of my job was definitely not being the ATF director. Yeah, the fun is, yeah, I mean, the funnest parts of my job and excitement is, you know, obviously, we're being a street agent and, you know, it's craziness and the fun. go to Harley on South Beach. I worked a case involving the Irish Republican Army. So I got to go to Belfast in Ireland. Love the cases, love being a complex investigator. The bigger the challenge, the better. So that part of my life, I believe, all of that, 20 years of that, then you become, you move up to the, you move through the organization and you kind of take all the new things you learn along the way. And next thing you know, before I even realized that I was sitting in the seat as a first deputy director and thought, how the hell did I get here? Nor did I ever wanted it. And so I would say it was almost like a game of musical chairs sometimes. And next thing you know, you're the one sitting in the seat when, you know, when everyone else around you is sort of retiring and leaving. And it was a transition that I had to be mindful of when I accepted. I can tell you that it was during the, obviously the Trump administration with AG Barr at the time had just become the attorney general. And we had the Russia investigation happening and it was very preoccupied with that. And Rod Rosenstein, the deputy attorney general, wanted to talk to me and see if I was up for the challenge. And was I going to be committed? Was I going to stay? What was my agenda? And he kind of wanted to run me through the gears. And so I'd never forget that day. go into his office and I felt like I was almost like speed dating. He asked me like 50 questions. kept throwing like softballs at me. And I answered every one of them because to be honest with you, was sort of like, if it happens, it happens. It doesn't happen. It doesn't happen. I wasn't kind of searching for the job. And it just became, you know, wanted to really know that I was in it for the right reasons. And I always tell people be want the job, not the title, not the, you know. mostly want the job and the responsibilities that come behind it. And not for any other reason, I was in a resume builder, I wasn't searching for a job at the time outside of ATF. But once I committed to that, I had to give it 100 % and I was almost mandatory retirement age. And of course, I got two extensions past my 57th. The attorney general asked me to stay, signed an executive order. And I think at the time the transition was did I, I wasn't quite ready to walk away from adversity, which was the biggest challenge at the time was 2021, you know, then we had the pandemic and then we had civil unrest around the whole country after George Floyd. HF had the largest, you know, massive critical incident response in the country at that time. And how would I, how could I ever walk away from this organization that I put my heart and soul and everything into and it wasn't the right time yet I was mandatory and I felt this need to stay in it, stay in the fight and it was a very difficult transition for me when I am now at the West Wing at the White House briefing president, briefing attorney generals and sitting with all my colleagues around from know, US Marshals, FBI, everyone. And yes, I was the only woman. But looking around thinking how the hell did I get here? And it was a transition of I went from a street agent that I fought for what, you know, cases I wanted to work with believed in. And now I'm in this sort of weird political. was I felt like my inside and my outside wasn't quite aligned. And there was a lot of turmoil within within me of. the challenge, but I would never ever walk away from the most challenging time of ATF and the most challenging time in my career, which was that time. Questioning also, yeah, it was. going to get irritated at me from taking you back, but you said something else. I know we could get in a battle of war stories if we wanted to, but I have to admit the Harley on South Beach reference was a little intriguing. So let me take you back one time and what the hell were you doing on a Harley in South Beach? my God. we, we over our group oversaw the keys. So I used to go down to Key West and at the time it was early nineties and, we worked a lot of outlaw, my motorcycle gangs were like Burt biker cases. And I just, next thing I know, was finding myself on a Harley and I worked cases, with lots of different groups and people. And the Harley was a pleasure, you know, with something different, something cool at the time. And, yes, I was say, so I went from whose life is this? The next thing I know I'm on the attorney general's plane where, you know, we're flying in, you know, doing press conferences and flying into overlook of the Capitol. And he's saluting and toasting. When an Irish whiskey whiskey wishing me a happy birthday on my 57th birthday. And he said, you you're not going anywhere. I'm not retiring. So I kept thinking, whose life is this? but I just, you know, I stayed until I was ready ready to transition. And I felt I'd given it all. I had given 30 years. I had left the recall on the field. We were out of the pandemic. So I felt that I wasn't leaving the organization in a bad place or anything like that. We had just gotten the largest ATS increased budget history. So I felt good about when I left. And You know, never did I, I wasn't looking for a job. I have to say I wanted some time. I wanted time to heal emotionally, physically, mentally, spiritually. After that, you know, three, almost three years, number one, number two, or number one of the organization where you're living with security details, traveling on planes, living in hotels. You're not even sure what you wake up. You're not even sure what cities you're in anymore. Did it all from funerals to giving flags to families being at Congress, getting beat up over your budget, all sorts of crazy stuff. And all I thought about was I felt ready to be of service to now myself and my family. And next thing I know, I was getting phone calls saying, hey, there's a job opening for chief security officer. think you'd be interested in it. will take you back to New York City. And I'm like, I don't want to go back to New York City. Born and raised in East Harlem, lived here many years, but You know, at that time I wasn't interested and I needed just some quiet time. you know, they said, I think you think you would like this job. It's at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. said, the Met? And I said, no, I'm not sure that Chief Security Officer, I'm not sure that's something I would even think about. Like I am not, I'm not really looking right now. If you're looking for somebody now, it's not me. I said, I feel like I just need to downshift and sit quiet for a couple of months, which I did. which I did. So that was part of the contingency of accepting the job here at the Met was I needed three months. I need three months to catch my breath. You're doing a great job, you know, making us true to our topic of transitions because you're a room full of transitions. And I want to ask you one more question because again, I'm not sure how many of our listeners understand it, but you, in my opinion, correct me if you agree or disagree, coming up through the ranks as you did, I don't think again, a lot of people probably don't understand that. You literally came up through every job, ATF probably. has to offer, you will, became the director, I think creates unique opportunities, but also unique challenges as compared to a political appointee or an outsider. Because you know that agency inside out, upside down. You've lived it, breathed it, suffered with it. And my guess is you may have had different passions than if you were a generic political appointee, smart person, but didn't have the history of ATF. Do you see that as, and all of our agencies, Secret Service, NCIS, with the exception of, I think every agency, the names have had both outsiders and insiders, including the FBI. How did that impact you coming from within non pros and cons on the outside. There's those who feel that having an ATF confirmed director through Senate confirmed, which is not easy. We've had one now too, because of really the right to bear arms in the second amendment where, you know, it's very, you know, it's very Democrat, Republican. It's Thank you know, down the line on each. being within the organization, my predecessor, Tom Brandon, was an agent within the organization. We've always felt we had ATS best interests at heart, knowing the inner workings and knowing the issues, knowing the work that goes into making investigations. So you felt like you can wrap your arm around it and protect it. The outside political appointees do bring the controversy, they bring, the issue was always we needed somebody who was a confirmed director because it would allow us to have someone who was, you know, had the political clout with the Congress for a budget, who would have more of the connections with the White House, have more of those, you know, stepping up to the plate and being able to keep the agency in good standing and not necessarily some from within that doesn't. doesn't have those relationships with Congress, doesn't have those relationships outside of our own organization. So pros and cons, there's those who feel that it should be because they can be more objective. You're coming in as an executive and you're making decisions that you haven't been with this person your whole life for 30 years and you're working with. It's okay to make some changes. It's okay to transfer people, make changes and kind of come in and restructure a little bit without it understanding. that could be a dangerous thing when your whole organization is seeing a whole different leadership style come in. So like I said, it's always been a gray area for those who feel like it should be legacy person who's been within. We always felt that the number two runs the organization. I would say that's person who keeps the chains on track. That's the chief operating officer. They're the ones who have inner workings of the organization and the number one comes in, it may have the political, you know, clout and have that, you know, relationship with the president because the president appoints it. But we haven't been able to do that since we transitioned from Treasury. Not an easy lot of, as you know, many, have not been able to get confirmed. And so it's been tough and if the confirmations did happen, it was always a one or two vote. It's never been that wide of a sweep. So, yeah. Well, yeah, and I know that political appointee issue is one that's, it's within many agencies, Secret Service among them, right? So we had a political appointee a few years back, but for the most part, it's continued to be from within, but it's a very passionate area that people feel very strongly about. So you went from kind of being in the middle of a tug of war between both sides of Pennsylvania Avenue and even within DOJ, so in the middle of Pennsylvania Avenue, to now being in a tug of war between antiquities and high value art, the highest value art in the world and and managing Kim Kardashian coming to the Met Gala. So give us a little sense of what it's like being there. It just sounds like such a fascinating job to be there. And of course, everybody knows the night at the museum and kind of thinks about it from that way. But it'd be great to hear a little bit of what it's like to be you there. I have to smile because I never anticipated coming full circle. used to sit at the steps of the Met as a young teenager, you know, contemplating my life. And now I see all these, you know, everybody out there at the end of the day doing the same thing I did back in the, you know, late 70s and 80s. When I accepted the position, I wasn't quite sure what it all you just kind of know snippets, right? You kind of know snippets. And again, once I met the people that have truly been here in security for like the 30 years or 28 years of the, you see the devotion, you see how much they love it, you see, and I again, watched, observed, listened. And next thing I knew, I was on six days and I had the Met Gala that came on an odd. time because of COVID, they were trying to do a catch up. So I start the job six days later, you know, on the red carpet. And all I kept doing was whose life is this? I went from the pulse shooting being the on scene commander going after you name it. And now I am dealing with, you know, the Kardashians coming in and their driver and where are they going to park and walkthroughs. And it was that first year was my head was spinning. But I also watched the things that I knew, whoa, okay, we got to make some changes here, you know, with the way that it was, you know, the security of it, right? So I'm responsible for the security of the one of the largest events that's, you know, all over the world that they broadcast is. But it's a fun job. lot of hours, I'm not going to say not a lot of hours on my feet. It's 21 buildings put together. 2 .2 miles and we have a staff of just in security of a little over 500, just in security. And so the fun things, the things that you see on TV, the museum, we do movie filmings. I get Martin Scorsese in here and Francis Ford Coppola was one of my favorite persons that I got to meet and he was coming here to do some. watching to see if he wanted to do his last film here and do some filming. And I get to have fascinating conversations with the people who come here, but there's a whole lot of planning that goes on for every event. The Met Gala, we do six months. We start six months before and then by four months we're tightening it. And then just when you think you have the whole plan, we bring in extra security, you name it. But I've also brought a lot of new things. And I believe in technology. I believe in bringing in new things to be able to help us track our incidents better, to help us be able to focus more on our intelligence. basically kind of restructured the whole department and I've been hiring talent. I've been hiring good people that I believe is really what's made it, putting all of those pieces from the professionals that have been here that have your 20, 30 years of experience that know this building inside and out, know all the nuances, know all of the things that make it work and the new, you have your former. police, former NYPD, former government that I can bring in to sort of really interconnect and now bringing in new technology. How do we write our reports better? How do we focus on our communications better? Are we tracking our security officers? Are we patrolling better? And that's been fun for me. I find the ATF job is stressful. This I don't find stressful. I find actually fun. My favorite parts We do events at night. Besides the 15 to 18 ,000 visitors a day that we get, Christmas week we'll get 30 to 40,000 visitors a day. We do about almost 400, 375 events. And those events can be anywhere from, you know, your big companies that want to host events. You have singers, know, Sheryl Crow comes, Sting, and they're the entertainment. So they do the highest end events. Obviously we host. during UNGA week, that's our big week. When the UN is here, we have every world leader. We host cocktail parties with presidents and every world leader. And I have to take pride in the fact that to be able to get a call from Secret Service, White House protocol and say, it went so well last year, we'd like to do it again this year because the security measures you have in place. So that feels good. And of course, getting a call after the Met Gala watching, you you Next thing I know, I'm on the carpet responsible for getting Kim Kardashian's $20 million Marilyn Monroe gown back to where it needs to go. And people going back and forth and stars coming in with exorbitant amount of jewelry and precious stones and gems and things and making sure that they get to where they need to go. It's a lot of logistics. It's a long process of planning, but I'm a believer good planning and critical incident response has been my focus. So I have to say this year we knocked it out of the park with, had, you New York right now is the epicenter of protests. So to not have a disruption this year was, you know, looked at very highly to get a call from Anna Wintour, who's, know, the devil wears pride of herself to say, hey, we just want to say, you know, how amazing the security was and to say thank you for that was a compliment because coming from her, it's somebody easy to get a compliment from. So these are the fun parts of the job. Every day is different. I love entertaining people when they come in. I always say, come in, bring your families, let me escort you, show you places that you never get to see. The public doesn't get to see, but I could take you to our operations center. I could take you down to the, it's like a whole city underground here and then even deeper are our tunnels, which have lots of art and lots of things that are, you know, who says spooky, who says, I think it's amazing. But I will tell you one fact. There is a shooting range down below two levels in the tunnels. There is a range, it's a range that the targets still work. because the Met Security back when it formed had a shooting team. And I got to go down there with the head of arms and armor, which is one of my favorite things to look at in his gallery, in his behind the scenes. And I got to go down and see that it still actually works. And so they have a shooting team. the Met and I pulled up some old archives in history to see some of their trophies and some of the things that the security team was able to do. So it's been kind of fun. Yeah, I have to say it's been kind of you know if the pulleys were able to come in within five feet so the NCIS agents could hit the target? They come in, let's just say that. I was, I zoned out for a little bit. Did you say something, John? Hey, I got to tell you, Regine, I love your overall enthusiasm, but you really sound excited about the Met and a lot of things you get to do there. And it's a great example of kind of what we've been focused on. You know, I love the background story where you were your ATF, touching on your ATF time. And now you're still, there's still a tether to law enforcement. There's still a tether to what you did and your expertise and your history. But it's a whole different story. I mean, it's whole different clientele, if you will, and a person can get differently. So that's great. I do want to ask you, before we get too far into our time, and we mentioned it at the start, I know you were sort of one of the founding women going way back as women became more critically important in federal law enforcement. I know John and I were supporters back when of women in federal law enforcement. the WIFLE program that started many years ago. Tell us a little bit about that and the importance that organization has played in your career and peers as they've sort of navigated through federal law enforcement over the last 20 years or I have to say, I'm a believer in you can't be what you don't see. And I always share that with women. You can't be what you don't see. But also I share that because if those who don't see women in leadership positions or see women in undercover operations or group supervisors or head of, know, height of task forces and things, if you can't see it, you're not gonna. aspire, don't believe you can ever get there. So I was able to become, you know, early on, see the organization of women in federal law enforcement, commonly referred to as WIFLE, go from a agency hosted organization to a nonprofit 25 years ago. the beginning of the women a federal law enforcement organization really started a group of founding women that felt, let's talk about gender equity, let's talk about recruitment and what are the barriers? What are the barriers that prevent women from wanting to not only take the oath and swear and carry a badge and a gun and be in 1811, but what are What are the barriers that prevent women from even reaching a supervisory or to the next level? Are the barriers something that we could openly discuss? You many women want to have children and how do you factor out all of that in the middle of your career when you're at the height of your career and you still want to have a life, personal life? So how do we help that? How do we, so the founding women, know, Margie Moore and many of the women, around all the agencies from Secret Service to Customs to NCIS, they're all still very involved with the organization. But it started focused on recruitment, retention and leadership development, and also giving women a network to be able to reach out to discuss those challenges and the barriers. At FLETC, there is a five foot wall that one... part of the, you have to climb this five foot wall or the type of weapon that you carry, the hand grips are a bit bigger. Those are the things and I always say, I don't wanna ever compromise and change skill set or change what needs to be done, but are there barriers that are just something that's preventing women from joining an organization? So we look at those types of things and the mission that was formed. then is still what they do today. It's still the mission that's in place today. So in my career, I looked up to those women that were in idolized and when I would go to the conference and say, my God, I can't even imagine when they'd read their resumes or they would read off their history and all the things that they've done. And I would listen and I think, wow, like I will never get to that place as a young agent. And it You can't be what you don't see. And I always say, don't question your ability to lead because I've watched the women before me and I use those as inspiration and use those opportunities to say, don't walk away from a challenge and use them as inspiration. And still to this day, I am a huge believer in mentoring. I mentor a lot of women. I have a young NCIS, she's an executive now, who I spent Saturday on the phone with for an hour, asking my advice, asking, she shadowed me when I was the ATF director for a while. And she asked me my opinions, advice on new challenges, that fire in your belly you need to feel. And so I still take pride in doing a lot of that. I believe in giving back. I've been blessed with an amazing career and I've had some great mentors. So if I can still be that and Whipple gives me opportunity to still step in and be able to now I'm on their advisory board. I do believe that the direction that they're going, you we go ups and downs. know, when we had challenges in recruitment, why? Why are we still 11 %? federal government, why can we reach out 30, can we get to 14? Now there's a 30, 30 and 30. That's the mantra for the next, can you be 30 % women in 2030? So we're, you we do work with each organization to say, what are your hiring practices? Where are you fishing? I would say if you're fishing with a net and not a spear, maybe you're going in the wrong pond when you're fishing for the right talent. it's been, I've been, asked to step in to be an advisor now, which I'm very pleased with because it keeps me still in a personal fulfillment because I do still have that personal fulfillment Well, that's great. And I know personally, from my own history, all the things you just said, Wiffle's been, and I'm glad to hear continues to be a very impactful organization across the board. You you outline a lot of the challenges, no matter where you work, what agency you're with, particularly in this day and age, law enforcement has had its ups and downs in terms of public image. I'm sure added on to just the known challenges is the new challenge sort of in the last years. that you experienced of man or woman recruitment, getting people who want to come into law enforcement, federal, state and local, what the ups and downs of that and why would someone want to do it. Those are the kinds of things that I think Whipple can be very helpful with. And that's great to hear. John, anything? Well, I did want to ask Regina and give her an opportunity, you know, from your day job, which is, you know, clearly more than a nine to five, right, with all the gales that are happening in the evening events and, you know, taking you into odd hours. mean, what do you have any time for personal time? What do you like to do in your free I've to be. It has to be. I knew I do. Dave and John, have to say, I'm not the person that's. I don't go out to the golf, I don't golf every day, I'm not looking for that. I do enjoy, right now I just built a beautiful home in Algonquit, Maine, Cape Nettuck. I built a beautiful Martin farmhouse and I feel like that's my new relationship because I just feel like I want to try to connect with it and I have a phenomenal chef's kitchen and that was my dream. I built my dream home, I built my dream kitchen and I just feel the need right now to... That's kind of where my pleasure is. I do like to ride bikes. I like my walks on the beach, but I'm looking to try to get back into some movement. Maybe everybody's playing pickleball. I'm not a huge fan just yet. I haven't gotten the bug to play golf and pickleball and do all those things that all my retired friends are. You know, they're always asking me to, you when am I going to slow down? But I still have, I still have a sense of fulfillment with, with what I'm doing with work. And I still, like I said, I still feel this, I'm not ready. Am I ready to just downshift completely? I wouldn't mind a little time now, but personally, I have to say I've just been focusing on, you know, self care right now too. I had 10 days. most of folks again who may not know the inner workings are probably looking at you thinking you got a glamour life now. You're at the bed, you're hobnobbing with all these big names and, know, on the red carpet with them. You ran a very well -known, highly respected, critically important agency. You've got a major, just a wonderful life of fun. my God, feeling new. Feeling new. After time, I'm barely getting to bed. I could barely walk. I gotta ice my feet after the Met Gala. I can't even get home. Some nights are, you know, challenged. I just can't wait to hit the bed. I don't have that much of an exciting, sexy life. I still, you know, slip up in my pajamas and walk my dog in the morning and try to rush here for a meeting just like everybody else does. But I've been blessed. I have had family, my parent, my mom and dad the two greatest people at Walk the Face of the Earth who just gave me courage, they gave me support. My resilience comes from my family. I have to say, I do have, I've been blessed, but I my heartbreaks and ups and downs and challenges like everybody else, right, in life. Well, I love your and just my final comment. Congratulations. Number one again, I don't know how many people realize, going to ATF again, tough organization with a tough job. mean, it's a critically important mission to navigate what you did and become the leader of the organization is a special achievement. You deserve sincere congratulations. And I also say you peppered our conversation several times with the fun term, which I love because no matter how It is, and you've had many of those dark nights and tough days. There's got to be some element of we're doing this because of our commitment to the mission, but it's also be an element of fun, the people you work with. And I certainly appreciate that and what you said and what you've done and where you are today. So congratulations on all of that. It's been a pleasure talking to you, John. Yeah, great. and that home in Maine sounds just like idyllic in a well -deserved respite from all the chaos that you have to deal with. Just being in New York City alone is enough. Of course, you know it well, but still, yeah. And it doesn't matter. It's a, you know, New York is a, I would say it's a love hate. You have to meet New York head on. It's, it's not for, you have to have the same almost energy when you meet it. But I say, this is my new life now. I did it for the first time. have a job here that I, I still, still really like. And so I an apartment, nice little studio. And now I'm, am I this person is going to be taking my vacation home, going on the long weekends, coming back and forth, doing the commute. I don't know. I'm going to figure it out. But yeah. Yeah. But the greatest way to end it is your comment as a teenager girl sitting on the steps of the Met wondering what you're going to do. Now you're the owner of the Met wondering what you're going to do. No, that's great. I'm still contemplating. You're right. I'm going to, I still contemplate. still go on those steps and I still contemplate what my life is going to look like. And every year when that lease is up, think, am I going to expend? Am I going to get it? Am I going to stay another year? And then I, something in my life happens. And next thing I know, I'm still here and I'll just keep doing what I'm doing until life changes and takes me somewhere else. This has been fun. Yeah, this has been fun. I really appreciated the time. You guys make it easy. Look forward to talking to you. Thanks, John. Bye