DHS Flew Two Surveillance Aircraft over Breonna Taylor Protests | Hacker News Reader

DHS Flew Two Surveillance Aircraft over Breonna Taylor Protests

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I'm worried that we are starting to see the realization of everybody's concerns over the rise of surveillance technology from the past decade. Federal mass surveillance, reports of stingray use at other protests, unmarked federal agents throwing people in the back of vans. I'm not a fan of where we are headed.

Some of that footage from Washington DC with peaceful protestors being gassed and rounded up by unmarked agents so that President Trump could walk across to a church for a photo op looked like it was straight out of a distopian sci-fi movie.

These protests prove how powerful the mind control of social media can be. It could be that they are using these black people to normalize surveillance and discourage protests on legitimate issues. Why would anyone protest e.g. hyperinflation if it meant they would be compared to antifa.

DHS was already in massive trouble with congress for stuffing people into unmarked vans like this was a 3rd-world country. Not to mention the whole department is unconstitutional.

The idea of Federal police acting in states is unconstitutional on the face of it - especially paramilitary organizations like DHS/ICE

Not an American Constitutional law expert, or an American but if it was completely constitutional wouldn't it have been addressed in the last 20 years?

Both sides of the aisle have held power in America in those 20 years.

Unfortunately, there is so much that needs to be addressed but has not and will not in the foreseeable future unless something drastic changes.

To the comment below that is "dead" you are completely correct IMO. HN has too many gov't lurkers here manipulating votes. Most dead comments are gold.

I'm not sure what unconstitutional means here. The department is not named in the constitution, but then neither were the overwhelming majority of such. (You could say, "that ship has sailed" once the Department of the Navy was created.) It embraces quite a few agencies that go way back, including the Coast Guard, and the customs component of ICE.

In the US, the law is heavily tilted towards inaction, by design. To pass legislation you need 50%+1 of the House and 60% of the Senate and the Presidency, and after being passed it can still be challenged judicially. Any one of those can block legislation. It's actually quite rare for a party to "hold power" -- and even when it does, it would take a unanimous desire with in the party to wield it.

A notion can have very widespread support and still not pass, or get much serious work done. (It's common for the party in power to bottle something up in a committee without giving it a full hearing.) So lack of action isn't evidence one way or the other. It just means it's nearly impossible to do anything via legislation.

That’s nonsense. Federal police arrested people committing arson against federal buildings and processed according to due process. Legal and expected. Makes no difference if the vehicles were unmarked.

This seems like a reasonable way to deal with riots. I don’t understand the outrage, unless people are under the false impression that these were “peaceful protests”.

I'm not sure what else you call a massive protest where only a VERY small handful of people are inciting violence? Unless, of course, we want also want to talk about "lawful police"...

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