I encourage all to look at the DNS hosting records for fbi.gov. They are bizarre. There is a big identity question with who the FBI is right now. I'm not confident any unit or person is from the FBI until I see strong evidence / identification they bring with them.
A good example is how more and more subdomains keep slipping behind CloudFlare. Those could be hosted anywhere.
Another example, which I spoke to the FBI Los Angeles office this morning about, is Infragard Los Angeles. They literally have subdomains hosted in mainland China. What is going on here? [1]
No, it’s not called COINTELPRO. That was a program from half a century ago. Nobody left at the current FBI even worked there when that program existed.
COINTELPRO is common online vernacular for "spooks on the internet". In the the linked article it makes this clear, the programs have new names and the paper trail is minimized. In any case, it is clear as day when shills start shilling. Like I said, please, no gaslighting.
I DV'd after reading the first three sentences. DNS records are not ample evidence that a government organization's identity is in question. I can think of a lot of reasons why the records would be so diverse.
So to me this is not only illogical, irrational, and invalid on its face, but it's also muddying already-muddy waters while failing to meet that qualitative standard. By all means update us again when there's more credible evidence.
Jumping from DNS records to massive efforts to undermine/impersonate/subvert parts of the FBI is quite a leap.
I'm sure the OP's LA FBI contact appreciated the laugh they had when their local Dwight Schrute called them to complain about the web hosting of the "private" part of a public-private partnership.
>Among the special powers granted exclusively to the FBI under a Reagan-era executive order (No. 12333) are authorizations to conduct “unconsented physical searches” and “physical surveillance” for intelligence purposes in the US. The Supreme Court has held that the Fourth Amendment generally requires law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before searching cell phone data, but there is an exception for “exigent circumstances,” which is supposed to apply only to extreme situations in which lives are in danger.
It seems like a clear cut abuse of power. These aren't exigent circumstances, they're protests, and besides that it's not a federal problem. It seems like the 4th amendment doesn't have any power any more.
I feel like programmers/engineers/technical-minded people have an easier time being terrified at this kind of "exception" for "exigent circumtances". Because that type of person is well aware that an "exception to a rule" really just means the rule is formally worthless, since it provides no guarantee whatsoever.
You'd think this would generalize, but ask anyone who does security or has more than 10 minutes of social science education about programmers' general ability to ignore side effects and unintentional consequences...
> Because that type of person is well aware that an "exception to a rule" really just means the rule is formally worthless, since it provides no guarantee whatsoever.
If you think about it, rules themselves provide no guarantee whatsoever. They're only as strong as the institutions (aka. people) enforcing them. Some text in a book somewhere provides zero guarantee that some cop isn't going to assault you for talking back at him, or some general isn't going to turn the country into a dictatorship.
Learning about foreign governments (like British parliament) makes this a lot more obvious IMO. It seems like at a certain level formal rules start to become a lot less important than tradition.
Yeah, I often thing that way too, and I think this mindset in programming (and also financial engineering) of taking any little gap and maximally exploiting it is very hard to deal with legislatively.
It's hard enough to make a web form secure, trying to do the same with emergency response legislation, when the nature of emergencies is that they often take unforeseeable forms, is an intractable problem.
I've been beating this drum quite a bit lately and I understand this feels impossible from where we are, it feels impossible to me too, but the problem we really have to solve is figuring out a way to trust and be trustworthy when given certain responsibilities. Not just for emergency powers, for everything.
We don't have the technology to eliminate the need for trust, not even close. We have to work on constraining the threat model a little bit.
This journalist has absolutely no idea what they are talking about. Executive Order 12333 grants authority to the FBI (among others, with few exceptions), specifically as it relates to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence (EO 12333 1.7(g)(1)).
I'm not even sure where they are getting the "unconsented physical searches" and "physical surveillance" line from. EO 12333 specifically states, "Elements of the
Intelligence Community are not authorized to use such techniques as electronic surveillance, unconsented physical
searches, mail surveillance, physical surveillance, or monitoring devices unless they are in accordance with
procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department
containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director." It then goes on to infer the FBI is the only one who can conduct unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance on United States persons, except in specific circumstances.
In other words...EO 12333 specifically authorizes activities for the FBI as they relate to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities; the FBI may use unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance to support their investigations into the previously mentioned activities; and they are the only ones able to do so except in specific circumstances. Lastly, the protests in Portland would not be considered as part of literally any of the FBI's authorities in EO 12333, it would be from their authorities related to conduct of criminal investigations, which would require a warrant or consent to a search.
I'm not a fan of all this necessarily, but the fact checking in this article is mind-blowing.
>> This journalist has absolutely no idea what they are talking about.
>> I'm not a fan of all this necessarily, but the fact checking in this article is mind-blowing.
I'm starting to suspect that half of articles today are purposeful misinformation that fits a narrative, while the other half is lazy reporting and might even rely on the misinformation as a source, just perpetuating it.
I've never read NYbooks.com before, but is a book reviewer really going to give me accurate insight into legal interpretation? Nope...
>I'm not even sure where they are getting the "unconsented physical searches" and "physical surveillance" line from
>EO 12333 specifically authorizes activities for the FBI as they relate to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities; the FBI may use unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance to support their investigations
You don't understand why they're saying they can do exactly what you say they can do.
The only hiccup you've introduced is that you don't think the Portland protests would count as foreign intelligence or counterintelligence, but they would only need a very weak link to some foreign agent to allow wide scale surveillance. Hell, a Canadian protester would fulfill the criteria.
I mean, that's not really a hiccup, it is a cornerstone of intelligence activity authorities. Sure, law enforcement officers can make up a bunch of crap that provides pretext for an investigation/other activities.
However, I think you are misunderstanding the legal definitions and elements for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence. The Canadian would not be considered under either definition unless they are acting on behalf of the Canadian Government as an agent of a foreign power. There are specific legal definitions for all these terms that are worth looking into[1].
From your link, the definition of foreign power includes:
"a foreign-based political organization, not substantially composed of United States persons"
And, a foreign agent can be:
"knowingly engages in sabotage or international terrorism, or activities that are in preparation therefor, for or on behalf of a foreign power"
That kind of language is so loose. A good legal team could easily claim something something something Antifa foreign influence burned down a Target to meet that legal definition.
I think you're being a little naive about how these laws are used.
At the end of the day they do a smell test to see if there is a sufficient "foreign nexus". And there always is. 99.9% of the surveillance they do is political and never sees the inside of a court room, so it doesn't matter if their analysis is implausible or made in bad faith. [1]
Canadian: check. US citizen who studied abroad: check. US citizen with a foreign partner: check. US citizen with a foreign gardener: probably check. US citizen with a foreign car: check back in 2030.
As others have stated, the definition is broad enough to easily abuse. For example, as Wikileaks has been labeled a hostile foreign agent, any (foreign?) donator would justify all surveillance.
Further, I can't find a definition for "counterintelligence" on the Cornell site period, though I may have made mistakes in my search. Presumably, they could use that exception to surveil protestors "protecting" them from foreign influence.
It is defined in EO 12333 as well as in 50 USC §401a as, "The term 'counterintelligence' means information gathered and activities conducted to protect against espionage, other intelligence activities, sabotage, or assassinations conducted by or on behalf of foreign governments or elements thereof, foreign organizations, or foreign persons, or international terrorist activities."
In theory, they would not legally be able to without a Court Order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. At least not when it concerns unconsented physical searches or electronic surveillance of US persons.
Thanks, I tried to search the entire site for "counterintelligence" and got no results. That seemed unlikely, but I didn't press on. That definition seems to justify surveillance on anyone with a Russian bot twitter follower, or their associates. Basically, every protestor. Likely a convincing argument allowing surveillance of both of us based on this thread could be made.
>In theory, they would not legally be able to without a Court Order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court
The executive order in question already gives them permission to make such searches. You can argue that a court would find that order unconstitutional, but until such a ruling such a search would be considered legal, and would support what the reporter claims.
That is not what EO 12333 says/does. It says that if anyone is going to conduct the activities in question in the US, it will only be the FBI. FISA dictates the requirements as to how.
EO 12333 says the FBI can conduct foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities; then it states if those activities take place regardless of authorities it must be done by the FBI; FISA then lays out statutory requirements in order to carry out the authorities specifically as they relate to US persons. So no, the author is not correct. Or maybe a more generous way to put it is their point was incomplete in a substantive way. I’m not sure where the miscommunication is taking place.
The miscommunication seems to that you are taking it as a given that the FBI is acting in good faith, despite the history of both the organization and the use of EO 12333. Former government officials have said that the order is used to justify vast amounts of "incidental" collection, allowing the FBI to find one FISA approved target and commit the surveillance described.
> but they would only need a very weak link to some foreign agent to allow wide scale surveillance. Hell, a Canadian protester would fulfill the criteria.
The idea seems to be to gin up a facially plausible but totally spurious connection from Antifa to PKK via the YPG, to claim that YPG is a "foreign power" (ridiculous, but might be technically true under 50 U.S.C. § 1801(a)(5)), or that it's somehow the same organization as the PKK (false) in order to justify a counterintelligence investigation of protestors.
I wonder if it counts that a lot of this pot is being stirred up by Chinese and Russian troll farms. Do you think that would be enough for a judge to rule in the FBI's favor for the abuses that they and other federal agencies are obviously up to in Seattle and other hot spots?
Maybe I'm missing something here, but what I read is:
"...unless they are in accordance with procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director"
So you need to get:
1. A department head to come up with a procedure for carrying out the unconsented physical searches.
2. AG Barr to sign off on it.
That sounds like something you could do in, like, 20 minutes if you knew the right phone numbers to dial.
No worries, national security law is pretty complicated and a bit of a web of concepts. The portion you quoted relates to the ability/necessity for elements of the Intelligence Community to create formal implementing guidance of the requirements within EO 12333 (e.g., which activities can be performed by the agency, under what circumstances, etc.) Basically there is a negotiation that takes place between the IC element and DoJ/the White House in order to add some fidelity to the language in EO 12333. It is a process that generally takes years, not minutes. In addition, the AG wouldn't be able to make an exception that is inconsistent with the requirements in EO 12333. Theoretically, the President could amend EO12333 to allow for additional activities, but there are even issues with that considering Congress' role in intelligence oversight, power of the purse via the Intel Authorization Act, etc...
Ok, fair enough. I can tell that you probably know far more than me on this issue.
I want to pose this question to you because I don't know enough about the subject to pose the question from the standpoint of justifying it.
If all of the following parties wanted to make this happen:
1. White House
2. DOJ
3. IC element
Say all of their incentives were aligned.
And say that nobody was directly looking over their shoulder to blow the whistle and say 'hold on wait a minute,' then what would prevent this from happening?
Considering the actions taken by federal law enforcement during the protests, I see this as being in the category of 'if it could potentially happen, it probably has.'
Feel free to disagree. I'm here for the interesting discussion.
Oof, that is a complicated question to answer. In short, outside of EO 12333, there is the Constitution, other Executive Orders, federal statutes (e.g., Foreign Intelligence and Surveillance Act, Intelligence Authorization Act(s), etc.), case law, etc. which would have to be considered as part of that process.
I highly recommend taking a look at the Intelligence Community Legal Reference Book published by ODNI [1]. If you're into that kind of stuff, it is a fascinating read.
Sorry, I didn't do a good job of spelling that out. I was trying to be more narrow and keep it with EO 12333.
My argument was:
A. The definition of foreign power and foreign agent are loose enough that a legal team acting in bad faith could make the argument that protesters could be included in the latter group.
B. EO 12333 could then be applied to those protestors, which would allow the FBI to engage in unconsented physical searches, etc under the executive order
C. Could occur at a time when the heads of the White House, DOJ, and IC elements were politically aligned and showed no dissent
D. Could occur under a situation of disorganized oversight occurring during a time of national chaos
Under this more specific scenario, what would prevent this from happening, where a protester is included in a legal definition made in bad faith that makes an end-run around those other obstacles you mentioned (via EO 12333) to arrive at novel law enforcement powers?
Again, I appreciate you taking the time to talk about this. I'm just curious and bored so I wanted to play with the idea.
This is a bit outside of my domain of expertise from my previous life, but I’ll do my best to answer...
There isn’t really an end run around they can use. The definitions may be a little loose, but when it concerns a United States person, the requirements in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act come in to play.
There is typically a presumption that anyone in the United States is a US person, unless evidence exists otherwise, so the protestors in your scenario would almost certainly be presumed US persons.
As a result, a warrant would have to be obtained via the FISA court in order to conduct the unconsented physical search[1].
EO 12333 isn’t saying the FBI has carte Blanche to conduct those activities (even if the AG tries to say so). It is saying that IF someone is going to conduct those activities in the United States/domestically, the FBI will be the only ones to do so. It doesn’t preclude them from still having to abide by FISA though. There is a lot more flexibility for anywhere/anyone outside of the US though.
Hypothetically, could a coordinated modification be made to the EO and/or the agency’s attorney general guidelines? Possibly, but probably not for anything that is consequential. Like I mentioned, there are a lot of other factors that limit the AG’s flexibility.
That’s why when you kind of have to look at things like EO 12333 in context of a bunch of other policies and established precedents. It’s really only part of the story within a very complicated legal framework.
Sorry, it is late at night and my brain isn’t working as well at this point. I appreciate the discussion and if I can think of anything else tomorrow I’ll try to respond a little further.
"... the Constitution, other Executive Orders, federal statutes, case law, etc. ... which wuld have to be considered" (as mentioned in a sibling comment) wouldn't pose even the smallest obstacle if they all "wanted to make this happen".
There were so many things that we all thought they simply COULD NOT DO -- until Snowden came along and showed us that they were, in fact, doing every single one of them for years -- not to mention all of the other things that we had never even considered!
I just want to say, I was curious who would write that particular comment. So I clicked on your comment history.
Linux/BSD sysadmin. The CNN lite comment. An actual GPG key in your signature!
You're a real-ass dude.
I don't work in tech, but when I was a kid my first computer ran FreeBSD, because my uncle who was an Engineer handed me a box of parts, a FreeBSD disc-set, and some satellite tracking software he said I should "never connect to the internet because I copied it from work." Dude explained to me what Project Echelon was, had an unfolded Mac-10 receiver in his closet, and his proudest moment was when Noam Chomsky emailed him back.
Your whole ethos reminds me of him, so please keep being you dude because the world needs it.
> Elements of the Intelligence Community are not authorized to use such techniques ... unless ...
Perhaps "such techniques" were "... in accordance with procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director"?
I would not be surprised -- at all -- to learn that AG Barr (after consulting with DIRFBI Wray) approved "such techniques".
I commented on this elsewhere, but that is not legally possible due to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
Unconsented physical searches of US persons, for the purposes of obtaining foreign intelligence and/or counterintelligence, has to be ordered by the FISC. Recent examples of this taking place can be seen with Carter Page, Michael Flynn, and I guess even the President.
EO 12333 is really just saying that IF these searches are to take place in the US, only the FBI has the authority to conduct the activity. They still have to follow other laws, policies, and procedures that exist.
I think you just gave me an answer to a question I had, why Russians are mentioned in everything remotely discomforting in internal US politics. I am not saying Russians are not trying but their destabilizing cspabilities are way lower than the FBI's.
National security is used around the world to undermine basic laws and constitutions. This trend has to stop. Best start would be yesterday. Sensible constitutions have protection of privacy for a reason. Now we have old and slow people in power that sell it for a bit of profit.
Yes, this is one of the areas where western democracies have gone completely off the rails.
But how can it stop? It doesn't seem to matter how moderate and liberal the head of government appears to be, they condone this awful behaviour with the magical incantation: "national security".
Governments and the media are adept at spreading FUD by controlling negative messaging around terrorism, organised crime, communinism, the Chinese, the Russians, or whoever the boogeyman de jour is. A huge segment of the populace is is so scared they convinced that they can trust the government and the security services.
I completely agree agree with you on the 4th, it has become persona non grata to both parties. Republicans and Democrats are beginning to see the Bill of Rights as more "suggestions" than the actual foundation of our system of laws. I don't even think they consider it a "living Constitution" anymore and just consider it fodder for election speeches. Do not blame only Republicans for this, the Dems own it as well. Obama kept up mass surveillance and the unPatriotic Act as well as did Bush. They're all complicit. Sure Dems have a better record on progressive social issues, and some Constitutional "features" but so do Republicans with gun rights and religious rights. However both are ignore fundamental aspects of it that don't fit their narrative.
This article seems highly misleading in its conclusions. For example, quoting, "initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices" without any of the context in the e-mail makes it appear far worse than what seems to have taken place.
The context for that quote, is that an individual was arrested for Misdemeanor Assault on a federal officer, specifically due to shining laser pointers at their eyes. Upon physical search of the individual, it was found he was, "carrying a machete, a large mortar firework and a section of galvanized pipe with endcaps and fuze assembly". Lastly, and likely most importantly, the individual consented to his phone being searched.
Now, to the original quote: "CTD is sending Fly Team Agents to cover the interviews of individuals arrested during the night and early-morning hours this weekend. They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying. These Agents may uncover a situation like the one described in the previous paragraph...".
There is nothing in here that implies they intended to search the phones without a search warrant of consent. Law enforcement officals do not make it a routine matter to specify, "They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying once they have a search warrant or consent from the individual". That would be equivalent to me saying to a SWE, "I need you to go and complete X task", then qualifying it with, "and make sure you do x, y, z, a, b, c task that I already know you know and were taught to do".
The title of this article should really read, "FBI Team Sent to 'Exploit' Criminal's Phones in Portland". The fact that the individual(s) also happened to be protestors, is really irrelevant and highly connotative. There is nothing in the First Amendment that gives someone the right to threaten and/or carry out actual violence against another individual, nor should it allow for that. Not to mention, there are specific Federal statutes regarding assault against federal officials.
Frankly, if I was a protestor exercising my First Amendment rights, I'd be pissed that someone was carrying what appears to be a pipe-bomb to what was supposed to be a peaceful protest.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.
> Lastly, and likely most importantly, the individual consented to his phone being searched.
No, the individual did not.
This is a police-state lie that needs to stop. There is no way to "consent" to anything requested by someone who has a right to kill you at any time if they feel you might be a threat, and who is allowed to lie to you about your legal rights.
It does seem quite... incredible.. that such a person in such a circumstance would consent to a search. Can the government prove they had consent, or is this just their claim?
>The title of this article should really read, "FBI Team Sent to 'Exploit' Criminal's Phones in Portland". The fact that the individual(s) also happened to be protestors, is really irrelevant and highly connotative.
irrelevant? does FBI usually send such a team to exploit "criminal's" (until proven guilty blah-blah-...) phones?
"The team brings the FBI’s strategic and tactical counterterrorism capabilities to bear in partnership with other U.S. government agencies and foreign partner-nation entities in critical overseas locations to detect, penetrate, and disrupt terrorist networks."
Yes, it's irrelevant. Again, there is nothing in this article nor in the e-mail included in the article that suggests they aren't being sent for the purposes of being present upon a search warrant being issued or consent being given to search the individual's property. This journalist just decided to take the worst possible interpretation of the e-mail and state it as fact.
You may not like the FBI, but to assume that they are malevolent actors or are intent on trampling on people's rights disingenuous and unhelpful. I'm all for bringing government misconduct to light, but this article is trying to make legal conduct seem illegal by distorting facts and selectively quoting information to fit a preconceived narrative.
>nothing in this article nor in the e-mail included in the article that suggests they aren't being sent for the purposes of being present upon a search warrant being issued or consent being given to search the individual's property.
sorry, man, the "initial exploitation" language is pretty clear:
"CTD is sending Fly Team Agents to cover interviews of individuals arrested during the night and early-morning hours this weekend. They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying."
It is pretty clear that there is no specific probable cause, no search warrant, no consent, just a fishing net. That is exactly the process you'd want and expect the tax dollar funded FBI to perform in case of exigent circumstances. It is just these days the protests seems to fall into exigent circumstances category. Or as one of these emails says
"I can help, though their definition of exigency will be different than ours..."
I think I explained the reasoning as to why it is not clear and the journalist (and you) are reading into something that isn't there. Would you have preferred if the e-mail stated, "Conduct initial exploitation once you have a search warrant or receive consent"?
That qualification is unnecessary for a supervisor directing their subordinates that are well aware of their authorities and the policies/procedures that need to be followed to do their job. This isn't staff legal counsel offering legal advice to a federal agent, this is a routine communication between a boss and their employees.
it is you who is reading what isn't there - like "search warrant" and "consent". I refer to the words what is explicitly there - like "exigency" (which allows to bypass search warrants and consent) and clearly sets the context, especially when we are talking about FBI Fly Team.
I am not reading into it, I said from the beginning the statement in the email is ambiguous.
The word “exigency” isn’t explicitly there in the email. It is referenced by the author as being present in a separate email (which for some reason they didn’t include...?) and then qualified via a source as being facetious.
Even if it was there and taken literally, I fail to see anywhere in law, case law, the email, and/or the article that suggests “exigency” is sufficient justification for violating an individual’s 4th Amendment rights. To the best of my knowledge, that does not exist.
> Violent, criminal acts committed by individuals and/or groups to further ideological goals stemming from domestic influences, such as those of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature.
Let’s compare that to your description of the suspect’s behavior here:
> ...an individual was arrested for Misdemeanor Assault on a federal officer, specifically due to shining laser pointers at their eyes. Upon physical search of the individual, it was found he was, "carrying a machete, a large mortar firework and a section of galvanized pipe with endcaps and fuze assembly”
So by the definition already established, either this person was just a criminal who was engaging in this premeditated, violent, criminal behavior for purely antisocial reasons, or he was a domestic terrorist.
Maybe you could argue that the definition of domestic terrorism is overly broad, but at that point you’re basically splitting hairs to pick and choose which forms of political violence are acceptable.
Agreed, 100%. The challenge with using the criminal statues related to "domestic terrorism" (and even "foreign terrorism") has to do with intent. Because there is a legal element requiring behavior that is in furtherance of "ideological goals", there is a pretty high bar to meet from a legal perspective.
This individual's criminal defense could easily argue the individual had no stated ideological goal they were promoting (unless there is specific evidence to suggest otherwise, such as leaving a manifesto explaining rationale). It's much easier to demonstrate probable cause and/or prosecute via other criminal statues.
There’s no federal statute, at least, against “domestic terrorism”. Domestic terrorists are usually prosecuted for the actual crimes they commit. For instance, Dylann Roof, who murdered black people in a black church, was prosecuted for murder and for a number of federal civil rights offenses, including hate crimes and violent obstruction of the free exercise of religion.
However, from an investigative and enforcement standpoint, it’s useful to have certain distinctions even if those distinctions have no statutory power. If you rob a jewelry store because you, personally, are greedy, that is investigated differently than if you rob a jewelry store in order to fund your anarcho-communist militia or in order to persuade the jewelry store across the street to sign up for your gang’s protection racket. It’s still robbery all three ways, but it could be terrorism or organized crime in addition, which would also imply certain other crimes (e.g. conspiracy).
As a non american, looking at the amount of video clips from violent protests or people undercover in Antifa (Crowder, Project Veritas), I'm surprised there are still doubts: it's a terrorist organisation by definition.
> not permanently exploited without his knowledge.
You may be thinking of the narrow use of exploit in relation to computer device exploits, which may or may not grant permanent access.
In general, to exploit something means simply to take advantage of or utilize it. For example, to exploit natural resources or to exploit a weakness in the other team's defense.
I suppose you'd have to find a good argument for why the protester isn't exercising their Second Amendment right alongside you exercising your First Amendment right.
I'm not going to be the guy who says it's ok to bring a pipe-bomb to a peaceful protest, but there are plenty of people bringing semi-automatic rifles and handguns out to the protests and for better or worse, that's legal depending on local law.
I'm not sure what the legality of a pipe-bomb is. For example, in some states Tannerite is perfectly legal for ordinary folks to possess and carry.
Big distinction there provided by the National Firearms Act. Pipe bombs are classified as "destructive devices" and would require submission of Form 1 to the ATF, along with fingerprints, etc and a $200 tax stamp.
And that's just federal law. State law may have other restrictions.
So bringing a legal rifle to a protest might be legitimate (though not exactly prudent), but possessing an unregistered pipe bomb will get you prison time even if you don't bring it to a protest.
Tannerite is exempt as it's a binary explosive which apparently has special rules.
Someone could be wandering around the protest exercising their 2nd amendment right with a Tannerite pipe bomb.
I don't want to be anywhere near that guy because he's probably a little unhinged, but it's not something that would raise my eyebrows these days if I saw it on the news.
>The term “destructive device” means (1) any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas (A) bomb, (B) grenade, (C) rocket having a propellent charge of more than four ounces, (D) missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce, (E) mine, or (F) similar device;
I would argue that packing tannerite into a capped pipe turns it into a grenade or bomb, and thus a destructive device.
IANAL: What I've heard is that according to the government unmixed tannerite is 'not an explosive' but once you mix it, it becomes an explosive. And you need permits and licensing to transport or store an explosive, but not to make (mix) it and use it immediately. You can't mix it at home, put it in your car, then drive to the gun range to use it. However I would expect the feds to find a way to charge you if they found unmixed tannerite and pipebomb parts in your backpack.. maybe constructive intent? I would hope so anyway.
So, I guess if the FBI knew hypothetical pipe bomber was around, they would arrest him. If it was the FBI, and they were looking for him specifically, they would most likely have sufficient additional evidence to prove intent. This is because he would have had to get on their radar somehow, and however that happened would likely supply sufficient evidence to prove intent.
Local police would have to take a different approach, since they would have a much more difficult time proving intent. If they just arrested some random guy with tannerite and a pipe, the prosecutor would then have to go out and construct a case for intent from scratch.
tl;dr: The moment you mix tannerite it becomes an explosive, and about the only legal thing you can do with it is blow it up in a safe manner. Though obviously, that's just a "tl;dr" from a non-lawyer watching a youtube video by a non-lawyer. :)
I am curious, however, if it legally becomes a regulated explosive when mixed, how would the law deal with an explosive device that only mixed the compound at the moment of detonation.
For example, a pipe bomb where the binary explosives were separated by plastic bags, but there was a wire that would be pulled through the device prior to detonation, mixing the two compounds.
I realize that it's kind of a weird edge-case, but I'm just sort of pushing it there because I'm curious and I want to see how far I can take the argument before I'm clearly wrong.
An interesting question along those lines is what's the status of flour bombs? Powder explosions can be pretty powerful if conditions are just right.
I've heard of authorities accidentally(1) outlawing the mixing of vinegar and baking soda in attempts to make dry-ice bombs illegal... so who knows?
1) as in, some lawyers thought the laws as written were broad enough to cover that in theory - I've never heard of someone actually being arrested on that basis.
> carrying a machete, a large mortar firework and a section of galvanized pipe with endcaps and fuze assembly
All items that can plausibly be weapons, and used dangerously. As others have pointed out, though, had he been carrying a .223 rifle with a 30 round magazine (an objectively more dangerous object) I can't imagine you reaching the same conclusion.
Why is a guy with a fused (but apparently not filled?) pipe bomb presumptively a "criminal" but a guy with a rifle not? Doesn't that have something to do with expression? Shouldn't that distinction be presumptively respected by law enforcement?
You can use a rifle to defend yourself (which is how Kyle Rittenhouse wasn't murdered by the angry mob), you can't use a destructive device to defend yourself, just to cause destruction.
There are often more restrictive laws against weapons that are not firearms because the 2nd amendment has been held to concern firearms, not weapons in general.
E.g., in Seattle any fixed blade is illegal to carry. Even chefs have to take special precaution if they want to carry their knives to and from work. Same for hunters/fishermen (fillet knives) heading to or from the wild.
In Oregon (and probably most states), it is illegal conceal most knives, except pocket knives.
Often, the same laws restricting knives cover brass knuckles, clubs, etc.
"any person who carries concealed upon the person any knife having a blade that projects or swings into position by force of a spring or by centrifugal force, any dirk, dagger, ice pick, slungshot, metal knuckles, or any similar instrument by the use of which injury could be inflicted upon the person or property of any other person, commits a Class B misdemeanor" https://www.oregonlaws.org/ors/166.240
One of those "I wish you could tie a news event to follow ups" moments: does the alleged pipe bomb ever appear in court as evidence? What happened to the arrestee?
The entire point of the protests is to complain about the willingness of the police to lie and fabricate evidence to cover their misconduct.
It’s worth remembering that some of these powerful green ‘laser pointers’ you can buy online can cause permanent eye damage or blindness in a fraction of a second. Sometimes even diffuse reflections of the beam can be hazardous. They’re a real danger to the genuinely peaceful protestors as well as the police that they’ve been aimed at.
If it was a war (some argue that the unrest may be the start of a civil war), using lasers as blinding weapons is actually a war crime.
> "Nothing in the emails indicates that the DHS or the FBI exceeded its legal authorities in Portland. But it is not generally understood how extensive those authorities in fact are—they go far beyond those held by the DHS, especially if the president and attorney general get involved. Among the special powers granted exclusively to the FBI under a Reagan-era executive order (No. 12333) are authorizations to conduct “unconsented physical searches” and “physical surveillance” for intelligence purposes in the US. The Supreme Court has held that the Fourth Amendment generally requires law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before searching cell phone data, but there is an exception for “exigent circumstances,” which is supposed to apply only to extreme situations in which lives are in danger."
Despite the constant repetition of the "peaceful protestors" falsehood (a clever tactic to sweep the destruction and violence under the rug), peoples lives were being put in danger. Not just in Portland, but all over the country, and local law enforcement weren't doing their jobs.
> “It’s high time for the FBI and DHS to give Oregonians a straight answer about what their agents have been up to in Portland,” he said in a statement. “The full extent of federal surveillance in Portland remains unknown, but it would be outrageous if Oregonians were targeted because of their political activities.”
"Political activities" is just more clever turn-of-phrase to say "lighting things on fire and destroying private and public property with [politics] as a convenient excuse." There's a big gap between organizing, speaking, and holding up signs and throwing molotov cocktails into crowds.
A lot of what happened was/is domestic terrorism and the only reason it's being tiptoed around is because we're in an election year.
> A lot of what happened was/is domestic terrorism
Check your facts.
This is so wildly off base I'm surprised this comment is still here. This is the pumped up FOX/alt-right narrative. Domestic terrorism is the alt-right creating militias to abduct governors (yesterday) or kill state senators (see: Oregon last summer). Smashing a Starbucks window or starting a fire in a garbage can (or a half-assed molotove cocktail) is faaaaar from opening fire nightly on thousands of protestors, gassing them with banned CS gas, and trying to disappear them in unmarked cars, done by unmarked goons with no badges.
> Violent, criminal acts committed by individuals and/or groups to further ideological goals stemming from domestic influences, such as those of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature.
Now, a peaceful protest that spontaneously turns into a riot probably shouldn’t qualify, but when the same people show up night after night over 100 nights in a row to engage in premeditated violent and criminal behavior based on political and ideological motivations—it meets the standard, as does the plot against Gov. Whitmer and so on. It is an extremely low-intensity form of terrorism, but it is the illegal use of violence for political purposes. Check your facts yourself before making excuses for this behavior.
Most of the people showing up aren't there to cause violence or criminal behavior. If you want to call the violent arsonists "domestic terrorists" that's one thing, but the protests as a whole do not have violence as their purpose, nor most of their members, so labelling the protests as a whole "domestic terrorism" is an over reach of the term. A few dozen criminals with lighter fluid and matches don't turn the other few thousand people into terrorists.
When the same protest in the same place every single night turns to violence 100 nights in a row though, and when the violent people deliberately use peaceful protests as a smokescreen for their behavior, it does start to get suspicious why a peaceful protester would show up for that kind of thing night after night.
You are absolutely wrong that at the "same protest in the same place every single night turns to violence 100 nights in a row."
The reason people like me showed up multiple times to these protests is because these issues matter and we Portlanders don't want the narrative to be that our end goal was to be violent. I've got kids that are biracial who will be impacted by police brutality, I've got relatives that have been impacted, and I have friends who have dealt with the issues we are protesting.
What else should I do beyond peaceful protesting en masse? Did taking a knee for four years like Colin Kaepernik did result in substantial changes to the system?
You can suspect all you want. You could consider that perhaps those causing violence are attempting to brand these protests as something else. That's not my intention nor the intention of the people I know who are there, nor the other people of Portland I know who support these protests.
And, that should not be my problem to fix.
You could consider that to be your problem of your perception or a problem of your understanding, and do something about that, like talk to the people protesting, instead of reading the "news" which, I dunno, could be slightly biased.
Have you engaged with people protesting and asked them: why are you there night after night? You know my answer now. Otherwise, you are getting your answers from people who aren't there, or who might have an agenda different than mine.
I’m sure that you, personally, did not set any fires, try to burn down a federal courthouse or the residential building where your mayor lives, nor have you assaulted law enforcement officers, attempted to blind them with lasers, physically interfered in legal arrests of the people who did these things, or murdered any of the Trump supporters who showed up to counter protest one day. But others in Portland have committed all of these crimes, and you should be even more upset about it than I am because these criminal terrorists are the ones undermining the cause you claim to care so much about.
If they had another way to push back against the societal diminishment and dehumanization from subtle, and sometimes not so subtle sources. So they go out and try to keep awareness of the issue high. If others only want to destroy, and others who would seek to intimidate them and deny a problem exists-- if they show up as well, the protesters are both blameless and helpless to do otherwise unless they give up their cause. If you were the target if oppression, would you give up your cause when people with no sympathy showed up and caused trouble?
Think of it in simpler terms. You're at work and someone shouts you down every time you try to say something. Are you to blame that their shouting disturbs the office? Should you stop trying to speak?
Except at work, if management refused to act to fix the situation, you could at least try to find another job. Finding another society is rather more difficult, and the best way is usually not by finding another place, but by changing the one you have into the one you want.
These are not right-wing boogeymen: this is reality. I constantly hear "check your facts" in the face of clear objectivity. You're using classic "whataboutism" to ignore reality. In essence, you're proving the exact argument I'm making above.
Speaking to the point you're making, all I can say is: play stupid games, win stupid prizes. People want to LARP as revolutionaries and now they're learning what that means. That doesn't make it right, it's just reality.
Careful of the source folks: Andy ngo is a grifter who is close with the proud boys, an organization whose members are currently facing charges or charged across the US with violent crimes ranging from battery to murder.
He’s not the source. You making that association for others was a character attack trying to undermine the credibility of the information I posted. A common psychological manipulation tactic to distract people from valid information. I don’t know much about these guys but based on their stated tenets they don’t sound like a hate group: https://proudboysusa.com/tenets/.
I do not know how you would be aware of Andy Ngo as a source and yet not be aware of the Proud Boys, what they do, and how they operate. I highly suggest you review their Wikipedia article, which contains extensive information on their activities as a hate group.
I’m aware of them by name but haven’t given much time to reading into them. I gave most of that a read. It sounds like they’ve had members with ties to white supremacy, but the group isn’t overtly white supremacist (though, they’re labeled that quite a bit). The McInnes guy who started it seemed to shy away from that stuff as did the current guy? Are there specific hate crimes they’ve committed? It sounds like most of the violence they’re involved in is focused on fist fights with Antifa types and drunken bar fights.
The caption on the video says "BLM Protestors." There is zero evidence that they are operating as BLM supporters. This is an attempt to rebrand violence as something else. Why would he do that, unless Andy Ngo is a grifter and opportunist of the worst kind.
No, it’s literally the textbook definition of domestic terrorism. This is the reality on the ground. It is not a fox news narrative. The bullshit narrative going around is that they are abusing peaceful protesters. The fact that you attempt to minimize it by pretending it’s a garbage can on fire and that you pretend that police are opening fire on peaceful protesters is so far from reality I don’t know how anyone can still even pretend that is the case.
There is no way that anyone will make any sort of progress by debating this way. You will not convince anybody of anything.
If you have numbers that objectively compare the number of people committing property crimes with the number of peaceful protesters and clearly show that these were overwhelmingly violent riots not peaceful protests, please share them, along with the source.
For example, here is a collection of photos from getty images showing large numbers of people protesting in Los Angeles. They appear to be overwhelmingly peaceful, with small pockets of violence that are not representative of the event as a whole.
If you could show me a similar wide-angle shot with thousands of protestors, the majority of whom are engaged in violence, obtained from a reputable source, I would 100% be willing to reconsider my position on the issue.
That way we can all get on the same page and work on coming to a reasonable conclusion about how we should feel about this issue moving forward.
What’s kind of funny is they are on good grounds w that definition of domestic terrorism. Plenty of environmental activists sitting in prison on terrorism charges for burning portapotties at construction sites etc
I immediately thought to myself 'man, this guy is full of shit' and then I looked it up and was, uh, not vindicated on that one. You're 100% right. That's really depressing.
"Domestic terrorism is the unlawful use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual based and operating entirely within the United States or Puerto Rico without foreign direction committed against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives."
Right, as I said. And what else would you call arson against the mayor’s residence (among other things) for political reasons? I believe CNN calls it “fiery but mostly peaceful protesting”, which, frankly, is parodying itself at this point. An objective person calls that terrorism.
Well, the sentiment of my comment was more in amazement of how broad the official definition of domestic terrorism is (more broad than the colloquial definition as I have used it and seen it used).
Any peaceful protest that happens to, for example, temporarily obstruct traffic on a side-street could be characterized as domestic terrorism under that definition.
The fire that occurred at the Portland mayor's residence was definitely arson. A splinter group of 200 people broke off from the main protest at around 11:00 at night, trashed the ground floor of a residential high-rise, and some people set some newspapers on fire that was quickly put out. 20 people were arrested in association with this.
So again, the ground floor of a residential hi-rise was trashed, some people lit some newspapers on fire, nobody was hurt, and the people involved were arrested.
I really think that's stretching the definition of terrorism (as it is used in common language, it does most definitely meet the FBI's definition cited in the above comment). Out of the thousands of people who attended the protests, this seems to me like a small subset did something stupid that produced a small amount of property damage.
This is not an organized, funded effort to systematically intimidate through the implicit threat of force in the way armed protestors in Michigan have been doing:
The sentiment of those present is summarized by this Senator's tweet (cited in the BBC article):
"Directly above me, men with rifles yelling at us. Some of my colleagues who own bullet proof vests are wearing them. I have never appreciated our Sergeants-at-Arms more than today."
Seems like a pretty clear-cut attempt to intimidate through the implicit threat of violence.
Have the Portland protestors attempted anything remotely as organized and intended to intimidate to further a political agenda than the latest Michigan kidnapping plot?
I'm guessing based on your comments that you are also deeply disturbed by armed, organized, and well-funded right-wing militia/terrorist groups running around intimidating Senators with AR-15s and cooking up elaborate schemes to kidnap them. These groups scare me. It's not some random protestors doing something stupid and spur-of-the-moment. It's well thought out, planned, funded, and armed. It's organized with clear goals, and organizational hierarchies. And it has pockets of tacit state support.
If the small splinter group of Portland protestors had secured the ground floor of that residential building, and proceeded to go floor-by-floor with assault rifles taking hostages, then ok sure I would 100% agree with you that it is domestic terrorism. But, that's not what happened. Some unarmed idiots lit some newspapers on fire and didn't hurt anybody before they were arrested. There is no evidence of a plan, or organization, or a broader, concerted effort to intimidate through the threat of violence.
I am not a political scientist, but it is my impression that a lot of the unres...
> ” but it is my impression that a lot of the unrest in Portland was at least in part due to the swarm of federal law enforcement (no identification = no accountability) that were dropped-off”
It isn’t.
Show me anything that shows that the majority of protestors in any city in the United Stated during the George Floyd protests were violent
Nobody is claiming that the majority were violent. I’m not sure why that would be relevant.
On the first point, care to elaborate? Happy to read your citations.
I tend to feel that this narrative is a relatively accurate representation of reality:
“Ever since the Feds showed up, it’s been like war," protester Ted Park, 31, said, coughing as tear gas drifted through the air. "It feels like it’s re-escalated.”
Anyone committing violence for ideological and political motives qualifies as domestic terrorism. Rioters lighting buildings on fire (often with people inside), destroying private property, and attacking uninvolved civilians is a clear example.
It's pretty clear that violent rioters are the targets here, not the more numerous peaceful protestors. It's also a fact that violence is increasing, and not acknowledging that and saying it's always peaceful isn't useful to anyone.
As for your examples, a molotov cocktail is far more dangerous than rubber bullets and tear gas, and there seem to be no reports to corroborate your claims of disappearing people.
Domestic terrorism is the alt-right creating militias to abduct governors (yesterday)
Do alt-right groups typically post videos with anarchist symbols in the background? Where did you get alt-right from?
In a YouTube video from May, Caserta claimed in a 30-minute diatribe that "the enemy is government." Caserta recorded the video in front of an anarchist's flag and a map of Michigan.
This doesn't mean that he was part of the alt-right or identified as being part of the alt-right, but the "he was an anarchist" thing is a right wing echo chamber talking point being used all over the internet now to attempt to distance these domestic terrorists from the right. It is extremely disconcerting to see these talking points repeated here uncritically on HN.
You'll have to excuse me, but using Mother Jones as a source isn't exactly convincing. They are about as unbiased as Foxnews.
My point was less around "this is a left wing group!" and more around the lazy journalism that likes to bucket things as simplistically as possible. "Oh, they listen to Jordan Peterson? Must be alt-right! My job is done."
I wouldn't say alt-right groups (what does "alt-right" even mean?) are known for adhering to overthrowing the gov't.
> Jordan Peterson and Ben Shapiro, two common gateways to the "alt-right."
That's like saying left wing news sources are gateways to Antifa and domestic terrorism. Something either supports a white ethno state (as the creator of the term 'alt right' does) or they do not.
If you were arrested in Portland and the authorities had custody of your phone for any period of time, assume that anything “interesting” on your phone is in their database.
What’s interesting ... contacts, text messages, pictures/videos, email, ... everything.
Oh please. There is now over 100 days of videos of them attacking federal buildings and lighting the fucking mayor’s condo building on fire. The lasers they are shining into police eyes are powerful enough to ignite a piece of paper. That’s instant permanent eye damage if you get hit. You either have no idea what is actually going on or you’re spreading propaganda. This is a violent unhinged mob of proud antifa anarchists (and before some ignorant person says antifa is “an idea”, Portland antifa has their own website and wikipedia article - look up Rose City Antifa). Knock it off. They openly espouse their beliefs that property should be destroyed and that anyone opposing them is fair game for violence.
I mean, there were livestreams nightly for weeks of people throwing fireworks, molotov cocktails, and generally trying to attack and destroy a courthouse (a federal building). No editing, no overarching narrator, just live raw footage night after night.
How does your proximity to the situation change that?
Sounds like you might be the one who needs to go out then, because this is happening there, and I’ve seen it. Many Portlanders are still in denial about this, including the insane mayoral candidate who openly supports antifa and wears a Joseph Stalin skirt (and has a double digit lead in the polls!). I assume this is because they don’t go downtown at night and they buy the propaganda. Shit, a shockingly high percentage seem to not realize that the “damage is caused by undercover white supremacists” lie has been thoroughly debunked and are completely ignorant as to what is happening in their own city.
Most were arrested after a riot had been declared and folks were ordered to leave. Arresting them was not illegal and they were breaking the law.
However, 2 points: as most district attorneys showed, people who were just there and didn't do anything were not prosecuted and so shouldn't really have been arrested. Secondly the declarations of a riot could be wrong, but at the time being in a riot was a crime.
But let's ignore all that for a moment.
Propaganda.
'innocent people being snatched off the streets..' (...in unmarked vans)
Implies that the feds and local police are routinely illegally kidnapping peaceful protestors across the country.
The truth is that this happened in one street in one city on one night only to less than a handful of protesters, still prortesting once a riot had been declared by uniformed feds in one unmarked van at the same time as uniformed feds in marked vans were doing the same thing a few yards away.
That leads me to think that this small event has been turned into a propaganda story..it's a classic example.
in groups think the out group believes propaganda and that we in the ingroup are immune to it. Don't believe the hype.
...and then what? Do they have a massive database of phone images that they can search enmasse?
I've heard stories of DHS taking phones to make copies of them - so it seems like they have a process of taking phone images, and possibly scanning them on the spot.
...but then do they catalogue all these phone images somewhere and are they searched regularly?
It sure seems like both sides politically really hate the FBI. I ask, when are they going to be evaluated? We should be rethinking the Intelligence Community in America, it has failed us. JFK knew this all too well.
Looking at other articles of the same website, they sound like they are the ones being investigated. It's just a beta behind a keyboard. Terrorists must not have rights.
The FBI's job is to investigate crimes "in the United States". So far as protesters were engaged in crimes worthy of arrest the FBI is within it's pervue.
That said: if arrests were made outside of criminal investigation we would hope the data collected was not retained.
Understood that the portland protests are a politically sensitive topic... But the fact the FBI was using all of its capabilities in a situation that seems to have the hallmarks of one interesting to federal prosecutors is not surprising (to me).
I think you are wrong in general, though I am not an American and won't pretend I know about the US protests in portland or elsewhere...
Why do I think you're wrong?
The purvue of the FBI needs to be a lot more specific than any crime in the US. We've seen more than enough times that such a wide purvue leaves them ripe for abuse (look up their treatment of MLK).
The only practical way for this to happen is for the FBI to actively justify their decisions on what and who to investigate. "Why are these people being investigated?" is a very fair question to ask and one the FBI should happily answer.
The only alternative to this is that whoever is in charge (POTUS) gets to decide with no oversight, no checks or balances, and no accountability.
We've had that in the past. It didn't end well.
Respectfully "it's their job to do this" is a really bad defense, it's the opening line to basically every abuse of power and likely will be part of the defense for all future ones.
If the FBI have a good reason to spend time on this, they can tell us and I'll happily support it. If they don't, they need to stop. But either way, they should not get a blank cheque to use a huge budget and enhanced police powers without having to answer to "we the people".
This should be an apolitical position, whether you're right or left, extreme or centrist.
Looks like they spelled “anarchists” and “rioters” wrong. Obviously the FBI do not care about the regular protesters. It’s the ones organizing to try and light buildings on fire that require a response.
I guess that if you've got a lot of toys to use against terrorists, and there are no terrorists on the radar, you go out and see if you can find some. Or invent some.
And if the other countries won't let you in to play...
From what I see on social media, the events at Portland is a bit of protest and a bit of terrorism (if defined as political violence, which is a legal definition), so if there are laws on the books (whether or not we agree with those laws), they would be applicable to the violent ones.
There was a federal courthouse building which was under attack for several days - I find the idea a bit racist that if there are Saudis or Pakistanis attacking the building, then it's terrorism, but if it's white people from Portland then it's not terrorism.
Now watch as scores of protestors are suddenly arrested for failing to declare gift certificates from their grandmother's on their taxes a decade ago...
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[ 4.0 ms ] story [ 207 ms ] threadA good example is how more and more subdomains keep slipping behind CloudFlare. Those could be hosted anywhere.
Another example, which I spoke to the FBI Los Angeles office this morning about, is Infragard Los Angeles. They literally have subdomains hosted in mainland China. What is going on here? [1]
[1] - https://www.infragardlosangeles.org/
It's definitely not that most people think this kind of talk is insane. Definitely not that. It's the FBI.
So to me this is not only illogical, irrational, and invalid on its face, but it's also muddying already-muddy waters while failing to meet that qualitative standard. By all means update us again when there's more credible evidence.
I'm sure the OP's LA FBI contact appreciated the laugh they had when their local Dwight Schrute called them to complain about the web hosting of the "private" part of a public-private partnership.
It seems like a clear cut abuse of power. These aren't exigent circumstances, they're protests, and besides that it's not a federal problem. It seems like the 4th amendment doesn't have any power any more.
or maybe I'm just projecting how I think.
If you think about it, rules themselves provide no guarantee whatsoever. They're only as strong as the institutions (aka. people) enforcing them. Some text in a book somewhere provides zero guarantee that some cop isn't going to assault you for talking back at him, or some general isn't going to turn the country into a dictatorship.
It's hard enough to make a web form secure, trying to do the same with emergency response legislation, when the nature of emergencies is that they often take unforeseeable forms, is an intractable problem.
I've been beating this drum quite a bit lately and I understand this feels impossible from where we are, it feels impossible to me too, but the problem we really have to solve is figuring out a way to trust and be trustworthy when given certain responsibilities. Not just for emergency powers, for everything.
We don't have the technology to eliminate the need for trust, not even close. We have to work on constraining the threat model a little bit.
I'm not even sure where they are getting the "unconsented physical searches" and "physical surveillance" line from. EO 12333 specifically states, "Elements of the Intelligence Community are not authorized to use such techniques as electronic surveillance, unconsented physical searches, mail surveillance, physical surveillance, or monitoring devices unless they are in accordance with procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director." It then goes on to infer the FBI is the only one who can conduct unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance on United States persons, except in specific circumstances.
In other words...EO 12333 specifically authorizes activities for the FBI as they relate to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities; the FBI may use unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance to support their investigations into the previously mentioned activities; and they are the only ones able to do so except in specific circumstances. Lastly, the protests in Portland would not be considered as part of literally any of the FBI's authorities in EO 12333, it would be from their authorities related to conduct of criminal investigations, which would require a warrant or consent to a search.
I'm not a fan of all this necessarily, but the fact checking in this article is mind-blowing.
>> I'm not a fan of all this necessarily, but the fact checking in this article is mind-blowing.
I'm starting to suspect that half of articles today are purposeful misinformation that fits a narrative, while the other half is lazy reporting and might even rely on the misinformation as a source, just perpetuating it.
I've never read NYbooks.com before, but is a book reviewer really going to give me accurate insight into legal interpretation? Nope...
>EO 12333 specifically authorizes activities for the FBI as they relate to foreign intelligence and counterintelligence activities; the FBI may use unconsented physical searches and physical surveillance to support their investigations
You don't understand why they're saying they can do exactly what you say they can do.
The only hiccup you've introduced is that you don't think the Portland protests would count as foreign intelligence or counterintelligence, but they would only need a very weak link to some foreign agent to allow wide scale surveillance. Hell, a Canadian protester would fulfill the criteria.
However, I think you are misunderstanding the legal definitions and elements for foreign intelligence and counterintelligence. The Canadian would not be considered under either definition unless they are acting on behalf of the Canadian Government as an agent of a foreign power. There are specific legal definitions for all these terms that are worth looking into[1].
[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/1801
"a foreign-based political organization, not substantially composed of United States persons"
And, a foreign agent can be:
"knowingly engages in sabotage or international terrorism, or activities that are in preparation therefor, for or on behalf of a foreign power"
That kind of language is so loose. A good legal team could easily claim something something something Antifa foreign influence burned down a Target to meet that legal definition.
At the end of the day they do a smell test to see if there is a sufficient "foreign nexus". And there always is. 99.9% of the surveillance they do is political and never sees the inside of a court room, so it doesn't matter if their analysis is implausible or made in bad faith. [1]
Canadian: check. US citizen who studied abroad: check. US citizen with a foreign partner: check. US citizen with a foreign gardener: probably check. US citizen with a foreign car: check back in 2030.
[1] https://www.fisc.uscourts.gov/sites/default/files/MIsc%2019%...
Further, I can't find a definition for "counterintelligence" on the Cornell site period, though I may have made mistakes in my search. Presumably, they could use that exception to surveil protestors "protecting" them from foreign influence.
In theory, they would not legally be able to without a Court Order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. At least not when it concerns unconsented physical searches or electronic surveillance of US persons.
>In theory, they would not legally be able to without a Court Order from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court
The executive order in question already gives them permission to make such searches. You can argue that a court would find that order unconstitutional, but until such a ruling such a search would be considered legal, and would support what the reporter claims.
My impression is that this is exactly why DHS wrote the Intelligence Report "The Syrian Conflict and its Nexus to US-based Antifascist Movements": https://www.voltairenet.org/IMG/pdf/471292844-The-Syrian-Con...
The idea seems to be to gin up a facially plausible but totally spurious connection from Antifa to PKK via the YPG, to claim that YPG is a "foreign power" (ridiculous, but might be technically true under 50 U.S.C. § 1801(a)(5)), or that it's somehow the same organization as the PKK (false) in order to justify a counterintelligence investigation of protestors.
[0] https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/idaho-family-portlan...
"...unless they are in accordance with procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director"
So you need to get:
1. A department head to come up with a procedure for carrying out the unconsented physical searches.
2. AG Barr to sign off on it.
That sounds like something you could do in, like, 20 minutes if you knew the right phone numbers to dial.
I want to pose this question to you because I don't know enough about the subject to pose the question from the standpoint of justifying it.
If all of the following parties wanted to make this happen:
1. White House
2. DOJ
3. IC element
Say all of their incentives were aligned.
And say that nobody was directly looking over their shoulder to blow the whistle and say 'hold on wait a minute,' then what would prevent this from happening?
Considering the actions taken by federal law enforcement during the protests, I see this as being in the category of 'if it could potentially happen, it probably has.'
Feel free to disagree. I'm here for the interesting discussion.
I highly recommend taking a look at the Intelligence Community Legal Reference Book published by ODNI [1]. If you're into that kind of stuff, it is a fascinating read.
[1] https://www.dni.gov/files/documents/IC_Legal_Ref_2009.pdf
My argument was:
A. The definition of foreign power and foreign agent are loose enough that a legal team acting in bad faith could make the argument that protesters could be included in the latter group.
B. EO 12333 could then be applied to those protestors, which would allow the FBI to engage in unconsented physical searches, etc under the executive order
C. Could occur at a time when the heads of the White House, DOJ, and IC elements were politically aligned and showed no dissent
D. Could occur under a situation of disorganized oversight occurring during a time of national chaos
Under this more specific scenario, what would prevent this from happening, where a protester is included in a legal definition made in bad faith that makes an end-run around those other obstacles you mentioned (via EO 12333) to arrive at novel law enforcement powers?
Again, I appreciate you taking the time to talk about this. I'm just curious and bored so I wanted to play with the idea.
There isn’t really an end run around they can use. The definitions may be a little loose, but when it concerns a United States person, the requirements in the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act come in to play.
There is typically a presumption that anyone in the United States is a US person, unless evidence exists otherwise, so the protestors in your scenario would almost certainly be presumed US persons.
As a result, a warrant would have to be obtained via the FISA court in order to conduct the unconsented physical search[1].
EO 12333 isn’t saying the FBI has carte Blanche to conduct those activities (even if the AG tries to say so). It is saying that IF someone is going to conduct those activities in the United States/domestically, the FBI will be the only ones to do so. It doesn’t preclude them from still having to abide by FISA though. There is a lot more flexibility for anywhere/anyone outside of the US though.
Hypothetically, could a coordinated modification be made to the EO and/or the agency’s attorney general guidelines? Possibly, but probably not for anything that is consequential. Like I mentioned, there are a lot of other factors that limit the AG’s flexibility.
That’s why when you kind of have to look at things like EO 12333 in context of a bunch of other policies and established precedents. It’s really only part of the story within a very complicated legal framework.
Sorry, it is late at night and my brain isn’t working as well at this point. I appreciate the discussion and if I can think of anything else tomorrow I’ll try to respond a little further.
[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/50/1822
"It’s really only part of the story within a very complicated legal framework."
I work in the biological sciences, and this resonates with me strongly.
When discussing things here I often find people taking isolated biochemical pathways out of the broader context of the biochemical milieu of the cell.
Now, I am one of those people, but I'm taking a single legal element, and ignoring the broader legislative milieu.
Plus I'm really high, so even the minutiae is fascinating. Thanks for taking the time to discuss. Appreciate it.
Not. A. God. Damn. Thing.
"... the Constitution, other Executive Orders, federal statutes, case law, etc. ... which wuld have to be considered" (as mentioned in a sibling comment) wouldn't pose even the smallest obstacle if they all "wanted to make this happen".
There were so many things that we all thought they simply COULD NOT DO -- until Snowden came along and showed us that they were, in fact, doing every single one of them for years -- not to mention all of the other things that we had never even considered!
Linux/BSD sysadmin. The CNN lite comment. An actual GPG key in your signature!
You're a real-ass dude.
I don't work in tech, but when I was a kid my first computer ran FreeBSD, because my uncle who was an Engineer handed me a box of parts, a FreeBSD disc-set, and some satellite tracking software he said I should "never connect to the internet because I copied it from work." Dude explained to me what Project Echelon was, had an unfolded Mac-10 receiver in his closet, and his proudest moment was when Noam Chomsky emailed him back.
Your whole ethos reminds me of him, so please keep being you dude because the world needs it.
Perhaps "such techniques" were "... in accordance with procedures established by the head of the Intelligence Community element concerned or the head of a department containing such element and approved by the Attorney General, after consultation with the Director"?
I would not be surprised -- at all -- to learn that AG Barr (after consulting with DIRFBI Wray) approved "such techniques".
Unconsented physical searches of US persons, for the purposes of obtaining foreign intelligence and/or counterintelligence, has to be ordered by the FISC. Recent examples of this taking place can be seen with Carter Page, Michael Flynn, and I guess even the President.
EO 12333 is really just saying that IF these searches are to take place in the US, only the FBI has the authority to conduct the activity. They still have to follow other laws, policies, and procedures that exist.
But how can it stop? It doesn't seem to matter how moderate and liberal the head of government appears to be, they condone this awful behaviour with the magical incantation: "national security".
Governments and the media are adept at spreading FUD by controlling negative messaging around terrorism, organised crime, communinism, the Chinese, the Russians, or whoever the boogeyman de jour is. A huge segment of the populace is is so scared they convinced that they can trust the government and the security services.
I just don't see how this can end.
The context for that quote, is that an individual was arrested for Misdemeanor Assault on a federal officer, specifically due to shining laser pointers at their eyes. Upon physical search of the individual, it was found he was, "carrying a machete, a large mortar firework and a section of galvanized pipe with endcaps and fuze assembly". Lastly, and likely most importantly, the individual consented to his phone being searched.
Now, to the original quote: "CTD is sending Fly Team Agents to cover the interviews of individuals arrested during the night and early-morning hours this weekend. They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying. These Agents may uncover a situation like the one described in the previous paragraph...".
There is nothing in here that implies they intended to search the phones without a search warrant of consent. Law enforcement officals do not make it a routine matter to specify, "They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying once they have a search warrant or consent from the individual". That would be equivalent to me saying to a SWE, "I need you to go and complete X task", then qualifying it with, "and make sure you do x, y, z, a, b, c task that I already know you know and were taught to do".
The title of this article should really read, "FBI Team Sent to 'Exploit' Criminal's Phones in Portland". The fact that the individual(s) also happened to be protestors, is really irrelevant and highly connotative. There is nothing in the First Amendment that gives someone the right to threaten and/or carry out actual violence against another individual, nor should it allow for that. Not to mention, there are specific Federal statutes regarding assault against federal officials.
Frankly, if I was a protestor exercising my First Amendment rights, I'd be pissed that someone was carrying what appears to be a pipe-bomb to what was supposed to be a peaceful protest.
No, the individual did not. This is a police-state lie that needs to stop. There is no way to "consent" to anything requested by someone who has a right to kill you at any time if they feel you might be a threat, and who is allowed to lie to you about your legal rights.
irrelevant? does FBI usually send such a team to exploit "criminal's" (until proven guilty blah-blah-...) phones?
https://www.fbi.gov/image-repository/fbi-counterterrorism-fl...
"The team brings the FBI’s strategic and tactical counterterrorism capabilities to bear in partnership with other U.S. government agencies and foreign partner-nation entities in critical overseas locations to detect, penetrate, and disrupt terrorist networks."
You may not like the FBI, but to assume that they are malevolent actors or are intent on trampling on people's rights disingenuous and unhelpful. I'm all for bringing government misconduct to light, but this article is trying to make legal conduct seem illegal by distorting facts and selectively quoting information to fit a preconceived narrative.
sorry, man, the "initial exploitation" language is pretty clear:
"CTD is sending Fly Team Agents to cover interviews of individuals arrested during the night and early-morning hours this weekend. They will also conduct initial exploitation of phones, or other communication devices they are carrying."
It is pretty clear that there is no specific probable cause, no search warrant, no consent, just a fishing net. That is exactly the process you'd want and expect the tax dollar funded FBI to perform in case of exigent circumstances. It is just these days the protests seems to fall into exigent circumstances category. Or as one of these emails says
"I can help, though their definition of exigency will be different than ours..."
That qualification is unnecessary for a supervisor directing their subordinates that are well aware of their authorities and the policies/procedures that need to be followed to do their job. This isn't staff legal counsel offering legal advice to a federal agent, this is a routine communication between a boss and their employees.
The word “exigency” isn’t explicitly there in the email. It is referenced by the author as being present in a separate email (which for some reason they didn’t include...?) and then qualified via a source as being facetious.
Even if it was there and taken literally, I fail to see anywhere in law, case law, the email, and/or the article that suggests “exigency” is sufficient justification for violating an individual’s 4th Amendment rights. To the best of my knowledge, that does not exist.
> Violent, criminal acts committed by individuals and/or groups to further ideological goals stemming from domestic influences, such as those of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature.
Let’s compare that to your description of the suspect’s behavior here:
> ...an individual was arrested for Misdemeanor Assault on a federal officer, specifically due to shining laser pointers at their eyes. Upon physical search of the individual, it was found he was, "carrying a machete, a large mortar firework and a section of galvanized pipe with endcaps and fuze assembly”
So by the definition already established, either this person was just a criminal who was engaging in this premeditated, violent, criminal behavior for purely antisocial reasons, or he was a domestic terrorist.
Maybe you could argue that the definition of domestic terrorism is overly broad, but at that point you’re basically splitting hairs to pick and choose which forms of political violence are acceptable.
This individual's criminal defense could easily argue the individual had no stated ideological goal they were promoting (unless there is specific evidence to suggest otherwise, such as leaving a manifesto explaining rationale). It's much easier to demonstrate probable cause and/or prosecute via other criminal statues.
However, from an investigative and enforcement standpoint, it’s useful to have certain distinctions even if those distinctions have no statutory power. If you rob a jewelry store because you, personally, are greedy, that is investigated differently than if you rob a jewelry store in order to fund your anarcho-communist militia or in order to persuade the jewelry store across the street to sign up for your gang’s protection racket. It’s still robbery all three ways, but it could be terrorism or organized crime in addition, which would also imply certain other crimes (e.g. conspiracy).
He consented to it being searched once, not permanently exploited without his knowledge.
You may be thinking of the narrow use of exploit in relation to computer device exploits, which may or may not grant permanent access.
In general, to exploit something means simply to take advantage of or utilize it. For example, to exploit natural resources or to exploit a weakness in the other team's defense.
I'm not going to be the guy who says it's ok to bring a pipe-bomb to a peaceful protest, but there are plenty of people bringing semi-automatic rifles and handguns out to the protests and for better or worse, that's legal depending on local law.
I'm not sure what the legality of a pipe-bomb is. For example, in some states Tannerite is perfectly legal for ordinary folks to possess and carry.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tannerite
And that's just federal law. State law may have other restrictions.
So bringing a legal rifle to a protest might be legitimate (though not exactly prudent), but possessing an unregistered pipe bomb will get you prison time even if you don't bring it to a protest.
Tannerite is exempt as it's a binary explosive which apparently has special rules.
Someone could be wandering around the protest exercising their 2nd amendment right with a Tannerite pipe bomb.
I don't want to be anywhere near that guy because he's probably a little unhinged, but it's not something that would raise my eyebrows these days if I saw it on the news.
>The term “destructive device” means (1) any explosive, incendiary, or poison gas (A) bomb, (B) grenade, (C) rocket having a propellent charge of more than four ounces, (D) missile having an explosive or incendiary charge of more than one-quarter ounce, (E) mine, or (F) similar device;
I would argue that packing tannerite into a capped pipe turns it into a grenade or bomb, and thus a destructive device.
But, I'm not convinced because the pipe doesn't seem all that dissimilar to the 'target container' that the explosive is placed in prior to legal use.
From the Tannerite website, these are the instructions for use:
1. Start by emptying the contents of the target into the mixing container.
2. Next, open the packet containing the catalyst and pour it into the mixing container.
3. Secure the lid and shake the container until you achieve a uniform color throughout the mixture.
4. Then pour the combined mixture back into the target container until it completely fills the target container then secure the lid.
5. Always place Tannerite® Brand targets at least 100 yards away from the shooter and/or spectators.
https://tannerite.com/binary-target-faq/
What is the difference between a capped pipe and the 'target container?'
Legally, what makes the leap from legal, to 'destructive device.'
https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/intent
So, I guess if the FBI knew hypothetical pipe bomber was around, they would arrest him. If it was the FBI, and they were looking for him specifically, they would most likely have sufficient additional evidence to prove intent. This is because he would have had to get on their radar somehow, and however that happened would likely supply sufficient evidence to prove intent.
Local police would have to take a different approach, since they would have a much more difficult time proving intent. If they just arrested some random guy with tannerite and a pipe, the prosecutor would then have to go out and construct a case for intent from scratch.
tl;dr: The moment you mix tannerite it becomes an explosive, and about the only legal thing you can do with it is blow it up in a safe manner. Though obviously, that's just a "tl;dr" from a non-lawyer watching a youtube video by a non-lawyer. :)
https://www.atf.gov/explosives/binary-explosives
I am curious, however, if it legally becomes a regulated explosive when mixed, how would the law deal with an explosive device that only mixed the compound at the moment of detonation.
For example, a pipe bomb where the binary explosives were separated by plastic bags, but there was a wire that would be pulled through the device prior to detonation, mixing the two compounds.
I realize that it's kind of a weird edge-case, but I'm just sort of pushing it there because I'm curious and I want to see how far I can take the argument before I'm clearly wrong.
I've heard of authorities accidentally(1) outlawing the mixing of vinegar and baking soda in attempts to make dry-ice bombs illegal... so who knows?
1) as in, some lawyers thought the laws as written were broad enough to cover that in theory - I've never heard of someone actually being arrested on that basis.
Blowing flour out of the palm of my hand into a lit BBQ cost me half my eyebrows as a child.
The ability of airborne flour to burn is kind of incredible if you haven't seen it in person.
All items that can plausibly be weapons, and used dangerously. As others have pointed out, though, had he been carrying a .223 rifle with a 30 round magazine (an objectively more dangerous object) I can't imagine you reaching the same conclusion.
Why is a guy with a fused (but apparently not filled?) pipe bomb presumptively a "criminal" but a guy with a rifle not? Doesn't that have something to do with expression? Shouldn't that distinction be presumptively respected by law enforcement?
Ignoring the protest entirely, you will do jail time if the ATF catches you with an unregistered destructive device.
E.g., in Seattle any fixed blade is illegal to carry. Even chefs have to take special precaution if they want to carry their knives to and from work. Same for hunters/fishermen (fillet knives) heading to or from the wild.
In Oregon (and probably most states), it is illegal conceal most knives, except pocket knives.
Often, the same laws restricting knives cover brass knuckles, clubs, etc.
"any person who carries concealed upon the person any knife having a blade that projects or swings into position by force of a spring or by centrifugal force, any dirk, dagger, ice pick, slungshot, metal knuckles, or any similar instrument by the use of which injury could be inflicted upon the person or property of any other person, commits a Class B misdemeanor" https://www.oregonlaws.org/ors/166.240
The entire point of the protests is to complain about the willingness of the police to lie and fabricate evidence to cover their misconduct.
If it was a war (some argue that the unrest may be the start of a civil war), using lasers as blinding weapons is actually a war crime.
Well within the law and normal.
> "Nothing in the emails indicates that the DHS or the FBI exceeded its legal authorities in Portland. But it is not generally understood how extensive those authorities in fact are—they go far beyond those held by the DHS, especially if the president and attorney general get involved. Among the special powers granted exclusively to the FBI under a Reagan-era executive order (No. 12333) are authorizations to conduct “unconsented physical searches” and “physical surveillance” for intelligence purposes in the US. The Supreme Court has held that the Fourth Amendment generally requires law enforcement agencies to obtain a warrant before searching cell phone data, but there is an exception for “exigent circumstances,” which is supposed to apply only to extreme situations in which lives are in danger."
Despite the constant repetition of the "peaceful protestors" falsehood (a clever tactic to sweep the destruction and violence under the rug), peoples lives were being put in danger. Not just in Portland, but all over the country, and local law enforcement weren't doing their jobs.
> “It’s high time for the FBI and DHS to give Oregonians a straight answer about what their agents have been up to in Portland,” he said in a statement. “The full extent of federal surveillance in Portland remains unknown, but it would be outrageous if Oregonians were targeted because of their political activities.”
"Political activities" is just more clever turn-of-phrase to say "lighting things on fire and destroying private and public property with [politics] as a convenient excuse." There's a big gap between organizing, speaking, and holding up signs and throwing molotov cocktails into crowds.
A lot of what happened was/is domestic terrorism and the only reason it's being tiptoed around is because we're in an election year.
Check your facts.
This is so wildly off base I'm surprised this comment is still here. This is the pumped up FOX/alt-right narrative. Domestic terrorism is the alt-right creating militias to abduct governors (yesterday) or kill state senators (see: Oregon last summer). Smashing a Starbucks window or starting a fire in a garbage can (or a half-assed molotove cocktail) is faaaaar from opening fire nightly on thousands of protestors, gassing them with banned CS gas, and trying to disappear them in unmarked cars, done by unmarked goons with no badges.
> Violent, criminal acts committed by individuals and/or groups to further ideological goals stemming from domestic influences, such as those of a political, religious, social, racial, or environmental nature.
Now, a peaceful protest that spontaneously turns into a riot probably shouldn’t qualify, but when the same people show up night after night over 100 nights in a row to engage in premeditated violent and criminal behavior based on political and ideological motivations—it meets the standard, as does the plot against Gov. Whitmer and so on. It is an extremely low-intensity form of terrorism, but it is the illegal use of violence for political purposes. Check your facts yourself before making excuses for this behavior.
When the same protest in the same place every single night turns to violence 100 nights in a row though, and when the violent people deliberately use peaceful protests as a smokescreen for their behavior, it does start to get suspicious why a peaceful protester would show up for that kind of thing night after night.
The reason people like me showed up multiple times to these protests is because these issues matter and we Portlanders don't want the narrative to be that our end goal was to be violent. I've got kids that are biracial who will be impacted by police brutality, I've got relatives that have been impacted, and I have friends who have dealt with the issues we are protesting.
What else should I do beyond peaceful protesting en masse? Did taking a knee for four years like Colin Kaepernik did result in substantial changes to the system?
You can suspect all you want. You could consider that perhaps those causing violence are attempting to brand these protests as something else. That's not my intention nor the intention of the people I know who are there, nor the other people of Portland I know who support these protests.
And, that should not be my problem to fix.
You could consider that to be your problem of your perception or a problem of your understanding, and do something about that, like talk to the people protesting, instead of reading the "news" which, I dunno, could be slightly biased.
Have you engaged with people protesting and asked them: why are you there night after night? You know my answer now. Otherwise, you are getting your answers from people who aren't there, or who might have an agenda different than mine.
Think of it in simpler terms. You're at work and someone shouts you down every time you try to say something. Are you to blame that their shouting disturbs the office? Should you stop trying to speak?
Except at work, if management refused to act to fix the situation, you could at least try to find another job. Finding another society is rather more difficult, and the best way is usually not by finding another place, but by changing the one you have into the one you want.
https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1314216315113009154
https://twitter.com/MrAndyNgo/status/1314031953146863617
These are not right-wing boogeymen: this is reality. I constantly hear "check your facts" in the face of clear objectivity. You're using classic "whataboutism" to ignore reality. In essence, you're proving the exact argument I'm making above.
Speaking to the point you're making, all I can say is: play stupid games, win stupid prizes. People want to LARP as revolutionaries and now they're learning what that means. That doesn't make it right, it's just reality.
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.vice.com/amp/en_us/article/...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proud_Boys
If you have numbers that objectively compare the number of people committing property crimes with the number of peaceful protesters and clearly show that these were overwhelmingly violent riots not peaceful protests, please share them, along with the source.
For example, here is a collection of photos from getty images showing large numbers of people protesting in Los Angeles. They appear to be overwhelmingly peaceful, with small pockets of violence that are not representative of the event as a whole.
https://www.gettyimages.com/photos/los-angeles-protest?media...
If you could show me a similar wide-angle shot with thousands of protestors, the majority of whom are engaged in violence, obtained from a reputable source, I would 100% be willing to reconsider my position on the issue.
That way we can all get on the same page and work on coming to a reasonable conclusion about how we should feel about this issue moving forward.
"Domestic terrorism is the unlawful use, or threatened use, of force or violence by a group or individual based and operating entirely within the United States or Puerto Rico without foreign direction committed against persons or property to intimidate or coerce a government, the civilian population, or any segment thereof in furtherance of political or social objectives."
https://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/terrorism-20...
Any peaceful protest that happens to, for example, temporarily obstruct traffic on a side-street could be characterized as domestic terrorism under that definition.
The fire that occurred at the Portland mayor's residence was definitely arson. A splinter group of 200 people broke off from the main protest at around 11:00 at night, trashed the ground floor of a residential high-rise, and some people set some newspapers on fire that was quickly put out. 20 people were arrested in association with this.
https://www.oregonlive.com/portland/2020/09/protesters-march...
So again, the ground floor of a residential hi-rise was trashed, some people lit some newspapers on fire, nobody was hurt, and the people involved were arrested.
I really think that's stretching the definition of terrorism (as it is used in common language, it does most definitely meet the FBI's definition cited in the above comment). Out of the thousands of people who attended the protests, this seems to me like a small subset did something stupid that produced a small amount of property damage.
This is not an organized, funded effort to systematically intimidate through the implicit threat of force in the way armed protestors in Michigan have been doing:
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-52496514
The sentiment of those present is summarized by this Senator's tweet (cited in the BBC article): "Directly above me, men with rifles yelling at us. Some of my colleagues who own bullet proof vests are wearing them. I have never appreciated our Sergeants-at-Arms more than today."
Seems like a pretty clear-cut attempt to intimidate through the implicit threat of violence.
Have the Portland protestors attempted anything remotely as organized and intended to intimidate to further a political agenda than the latest Michigan kidnapping plot?
https://www.npr.org/2020/10/05/920314527/the-michigan-kidnap...
I'm guessing based on your comments that you are also deeply disturbed by armed, organized, and well-funded right-wing militia/terrorist groups running around intimidating Senators with AR-15s and cooking up elaborate schemes to kidnap them. These groups scare me. It's not some random protestors doing something stupid and spur-of-the-moment. It's well thought out, planned, funded, and armed. It's organized with clear goals, and organizational hierarchies. And it has pockets of tacit state support.
https://www.wbur.org/onpoint/2020/09/01/right-wing-militias-...
If the small splinter group of Portland protestors had secured the ground floor of that residential building, and proceeded to go floor-by-floor with assault rifles taking hostages, then ok sure I would 100% agree with you that it is domestic terrorism. But, that's not what happened. Some unarmed idiots lit some newspapers on fire and didn't hurt anybody before they were arrested. There is no evidence of a plan, or organization, or a broader, concerted effort to intimidate through the threat of violence.
I am not a political scientist, but it is my impression that a lot of the unres...
It isn’t.
Show me anything that shows that the majority of protestors in any city in the United Stated during the George Floyd protests were violent
Nobody is claiming that the majority were violent. I’m not sure why that would be relevant.
I tend to feel that this narrative is a relatively accurate representation of reality:
“Ever since the Feds showed up, it’s been like war," protester Ted Park, 31, said, coughing as tear gas drifted through the air. "It feels like it’s re-escalated.”
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2020/07/22/portla...
On the second point...you did.
> "I believe CNN calls it “fiery but mostly peaceful protesting”, which, frankly, is parodying itself at this point."
It's pretty clear that violent rioters are the targets here, not the more numerous peaceful protestors. It's also a fact that violence is increasing, and not acknowledging that and saying it's always peaceful isn't useful to anyone.
As for your examples, a molotov cocktail is far more dangerous than rubber bullets and tear gas, and there seem to be no reports to corroborate your claims of disappearing people.
Do alt-right groups typically post videos with anarchist symbols in the background? Where did you get alt-right from?
In a YouTube video from May, Caserta claimed in a 30-minute diatribe that "the enemy is government." Caserta recorded the video in front of an anarchist's flag and a map of Michigan.
https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news/whitmer-conspiracy-al...
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2020/10/men-who-alleged...
This doesn't mean that he was part of the alt-right or identified as being part of the alt-right, but the "he was an anarchist" thing is a right wing echo chamber talking point being used all over the internet now to attempt to distance these domestic terrorists from the right. It is extremely disconcerting to see these talking points repeated here uncritically on HN.
My point was less around "this is a left wing group!" and more around the lazy journalism that likes to bucket things as simplistically as possible. "Oh, they listen to Jordan Peterson? Must be alt-right! My job is done."
I wouldn't say alt-right groups (what does "alt-right" even mean?) are known for adhering to overthrowing the gov't.
That's like saying left wing news sources are gateways to Antifa and domestic terrorism. Something either supports a white ethno state (as the creator of the term 'alt right' does) or they do not.
How does your proximity to the situation change that?
But let's ignore all that for a moment.
Propaganda.
'innocent people being snatched off the streets..' (...in unmarked vans)
Implies that the feds and local police are routinely illegally kidnapping peaceful protestors across the country.
The truth is that this happened in one street in one city on one night only to less than a handful of protesters, still prortesting once a riot had been declared by uniformed feds in one unmarked van at the same time as uniformed feds in marked vans were doing the same thing a few yards away.
That leads me to think that this small event has been turned into a propaganda story..it's a classic example.
in groups think the out group believes propaganda and that we in the ingroup are immune to it. Don't believe the hype.
They knew exactly what they were doing.
The fact they act up when they get remotely held accountable doesn't change that. It just makes them naive enough to think the law is on their side.
Its not, and most people want them to just fucking stop.
I've heard stories of DHS taking phones to make copies of them - so it seems like they have a process of taking phone images, and possibly scanning them on the spot.
...but then do they catalogue all these phone images somewhere and are they searched regularly?
That said: if arrests were made outside of criminal investigation we would hope the data collected was not retained.
Understood that the portland protests are a politically sensitive topic... But the fact the FBI was using all of its capabilities in a situation that seems to have the hallmarks of one interesting to federal prosecutors is not surprising (to me).
Hope the downvoters can see my point.......
Using a bomb for political purposes... that's terrorism, not protesting.
Why do I think you're wrong?
The purvue of the FBI needs to be a lot more specific than any crime in the US. We've seen more than enough times that such a wide purvue leaves them ripe for abuse (look up their treatment of MLK).
The only practical way for this to happen is for the FBI to actively justify their decisions on what and who to investigate. "Why are these people being investigated?" is a very fair question to ask and one the FBI should happily answer.
The only alternative to this is that whoever is in charge (POTUS) gets to decide with no oversight, no checks or balances, and no accountability.
We've had that in the past. It didn't end well.
Respectfully "it's their job to do this" is a really bad defense, it's the opening line to basically every abuse of power and likely will be part of the defense for all future ones.
If the FBI have a good reason to spend time on this, they can tell us and I'll happily support it. If they don't, they need to stop. But either way, they should not get a blank cheque to use a huge budget and enhanced police powers without having to answer to "we the people".
This should be an apolitical position, whether you're right or left, extreme or centrist.
But you need a permit to protest.
Riotous action is not permissible. Enter the FBI.
And if the other countries won't let you in to play...
There was a federal courthouse building which was under attack for several days - I find the idea a bit racist that if there are Saudis or Pakistanis attacking the building, then it's terrorism, but if it's white people from Portland then it's not terrorism.
I'm not sure it doesn't fit the definition of terrorist.
U. S. S. A has always been controlled by them has they created it. They've owned and controlled Britain for over 500 years now lol
Educate yourselves!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=xc9msnvRyJ0