Tag: police state

Making Our Rights Disappear: The Authoritarian War On Due Process

“If Trump can disappear them, he can disappear you. The Trump regime is already targeting immigrants who are here legally simply because they expressed opinions that Trump disagreed with. What makes you think he’ll stop there? With no court to verify anything the Trump regime alleges, you could be arrested and sent to a prison in El Salvador for having views the regime dislikes.”—Robert Reich

Imagine this: you’re rounded up in the dead of night by government agents, arrested and sent to a detention center. The arresting agents don’t identify themselves, nor do they provide any documentation indicating why you are being detained. Nevertheless, without your family or friends knowing that you have been taken hostage, without anyone knowing where you are being transported or why, and without any opportunity to defend yourself or proclaim your innocence, you are flown out of the country to a foreign prison in a police state where you will have no rights whatsoever.

There can be no understating the danger.

The war on due process is here.

No trials. No hearings. No rights. Just indefinite detention and secret deportations.

This is the fate that awaits every one of us, not just immigrants (legal or otherwise), if the government’s war on the Constitution remains unchecked.

As historian Timothy Snyder warns, “If you accept that non-citizens have no right to due process, you are accepting that citizens have no right to due process. All the government has to do is claim that you are not a citizen; without due process you have no chance to prove the contrary.”

More than two decades after the U.S. government in its post-9/11 frenzy transported individuals, some of whom had not been charged let alone convicted of a crime, to CIA black sites (secret detention centers located outside the U.S. authorized to torture detainees) as a means of sidestepping legal protocols, the Trump Administration is using extraordinary rendition to make those on its so-called “enemies list” disappear.

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The United States Of Tyranny: America Is Becoming A Constitution-Free Zone

“If tyranny and oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.”—James Madison

It’s no joke: America is becoming a Constitution-free zone.

Little by little, our rights are being whittled down in the name of national security.

Where do you draw the line?

How much tyranny will Americans tolerate in the name of national security?

At what point does this slippery slope of power grabs lead to dictatorship?

Will we let border police trample on the rights of everyone they encounter, including legal residents and citizens? Turn a blind eye when men, women and children are forcibly detained by gangs of plainclothes agents and made to disappear? Will we accept a national ID card that enables the government to target individuals and groups it deems undesirable? Will we tolerate AI-powered surveillance cameras and drones that track us more effectively than they protect us? Will we censor ourselves, fearing that any expression of dissent will mark us as anti-government?

Will we abandon the constitutional principles our founders fought for? This is the bargain the police state demands of us.

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Democrats Want ‘Misgendering’ And ‘Deadnaming’ To Be Considered Child Abuse

Democrats in Colorado have introduced legislation that would recognise ‘misgendering’ and ‘deadnaming’ as forms of abuse of children who have decided to identify as transgender.

Colorado Newsline reports that the bill, called “The Kelly Loving Act” after a transgender-identifying individual killed in a 2022 club shooting in Colorado Springs, would ensure such ‘abuse’ be considered in child custody disputes.

The legislation defines ‘deadnaming’ as “to purposefully, and with the intent to disregard the individual’s gender identity or gender expression, refer to an individual by their birth name rather than their chosen name.”

It identifies ‘misgendering’ as “to purposefully, and with the intent to disregard the individual’s gender identity or gender expression, refer to an individual using an honorific or pronoun that conflicts with the individual’s gender identity or gender expression.”

That’s right, calling little Jimmy ‘he/him’ after he’s decided he wants to be little Janey would be classed as child abuse.

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New Info on How the Feds Helped Censor a Bombshell

The US House Judiciary Committee has released internal chat logs, that show the FBI moved into cover-up mode the very day the New York Post published the Hunter Biden laptop story, on October 14, 2020.

The logs, first reported about by journalists Michael Shellenberger and Catherine Herridge, reveal that the FBI employees were immediately instructed “not to discuss the Biden matter,” while an intelligence analyst who, during a call with Twitter, accidentally confirmed that the story, i.e., the laptop, was real, was placed under a “gag order.”

The reason the analyst, who was with the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division, was able to so quickly confirm the reporting was based on credible information was the fact the FBI had seized and authenticated Hunter Biden’s laptop several months earlier.

Big Tech platforms – notably Twitter and Facebook – then started censoring the article, branding it falsely “Russian disinformation.” By maintaining the “no comment” policy instead of confirming that the laptop was real and under investigation, the FBI was in effect tacitly promoting the false narrative about foreign interference.

These moves originated from the Foreign Influence Task Force, which was shut down earlier this year for its activities related to censorship through pressure on social platforms.

The laptop scandal was unfolding during a crucial time in the 2020 campaign and represents one of the most egregious publicly known examples of political censorship of free speech and media orchestrated by government agencies.

The chat logs that have now been published reveal that one of the FBI staff involved in the Hunter Biden laptop story suppression was Bradley Benavides.

Only weeks prior, Benavides featured in another controversy: that time in what appeared to be a smear campaign against Senators Ron Johnson and Chuck Grassley, who were allegedly “advancing Russian disinformation.”

At the time, the senators just so happened to be investigating Hunter Biden’s financial connections to foreign governments.

A letter the Judiciary Committee sent Benavides in June 2023, shows that he had by that time gone through the Big Tech-Big Government “revolving door” – and was senior risk manager at Amazon.

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Canadian Cop Disciplined for Investigating Post-Vax Infant Deaths

A Canadian police detective has been found guilty of “discreditable conduct” for investigating a surge of sudden deaths among babies who died after receiving Covid mRNA ‘vaccines’

Ottawa Police Service Detective Helen Grus was charged after she started to investigate a large number of cases of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) in December 2021.

Grus found that SIDS cases skyrocketed after the “vaccines” were rolled out for public use that year.

The cop believed that the sudden deaths were linked to Covid injections, which all of the victims had received, however, Grus found herself at the center of an official probe over her investigations.

Following an investigation into her actions, Grus was called before a disciplinary hearing.

In a March 25 decision, Grus was found guilty of “discreditable conduct.”

Retired superintendent Christopher Renwick, who presided over the proceedings, ruled that Detective Grus brought “discredit upon the reputation of the Ottawa Police Service” when she investigated a potential link between sudden deaths of several infants and the Covid mRNA “vaccines” they received.

The OPS alleged that Grus “self-initiated an unauthorized project, wherein she accessed nine child and/or infant death cases in which she had no investigative role/responsibility, and failed to then record her involvement or finding in the files.”

Beginning in December 2021, Grus began questioning if Covid injections played a role in the increasing number of infant deaths she was reportedly witnessing. Accordingly, she attempted to determine if either the babies or their parents had received the experimental “vaccine.”

After it was revealed that Grus was conducting these investigations, she was suspended from performing her duties by the Ottawa Police Service’s professional standards unit.

Officials then filed a disciplinary charge against Grus and forced her to defend her actions in front of a tribunal.

OPS alleges that Grus transgressed a professional boundary by looking into the infant deaths for cases in which she had no investigative role. One incident occurred in January 2022 when Grus allegedly contacted the father of an infant who suddenly died.

Grus sought to inquire into the vaccination status of the baby’s mother. Along with her lawyer, Bath-Sheba van den Berg, Grus argued that the probe into the deaths was within the detective’s sphere of authority as a member of the sex assault and child abuse (SACA) unit.

SACA is tasked with investigating deaths of children under five. Additionally, the protocol for SIDS (Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) includes gathering information regarding the medical history of parents.

Information gathering includes all street, over-the-counter, and prescription drug use. During the hearing, van den Berg argued that Grus had taken “reasonable steps” after noticing a “doubling or tripling” of infant deaths since the Covid “vaccine” rollout.

Furthermore, Grus “saw it as her duty to investigate criminal negligence on the part of the government.”

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Police Watch and Do Nothing as Masked Antifa Vandals Violently Attack TPUSA Students, Staff at UC Davis

Masked Antifa vandals violently attacked TPUSA staff at a tabling event at UC Davis on Thursday.

The far-left protestors completely destroyed TPUSA’s “Prove Me Wrong” tabling event with former police officer Brandon Tatum. They stole the tent, ripped down the TPUSA banners and tried to steal the TPUSA staffer’s iPad and electronics.

Police officers stood by and did nothing to stop the Antifa thugs as they destroyed the TPUSA canopy and assaulted students.

“Antifascista! A! Anti!” Antifa protestors chanted as they destroyed the TPUSA table.

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Here Are The WhatsApp Messages Those British Parents Were ARRESTED For…

A British couple who were arrested for complaining about their child’s school in a WhatsApp group have revealed the messages that led to their insane incarceration.

As we highlighted earlier this week, Police arrested Maxie Allen and Rosalind Levin in front of their daughter on suspicion of malicious communications, harassment, and causing a nuisance on school property.

Mr Allen noted “we have never even been told what these communications were that were supposedly criminal, which is completely Kafkaesque.”

Now the messages have come to light, and they are completely innocuous.

The couple complained about the process school governors were undertaking to appoint a new headteacher, and were sent a letter by the school warning them to stop discussing it.

Following this, Levine texted the group saying “they think they have a right to control everyone” adding that parents are free to “discuss anything they like”.

She further ironically joked that the school would have them arrested, writing “Can you imagine what the ‘action’ is? Hello, 999, one of the school mums said something mean about me in a school mum WhatsApp group. Please can you arrest them?”

Allen added that “No public body has the power to control what people say about it.”

The Daily Mail noted that other parents in the group supported that sentiment.

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J6 Political Prisoner Dan Wilson Forced to Self-Surrender By Activist TDS Judge

Almost two weeks after The Gateway Pundit published our story on January 6er Dan Wilson, he has had to self-surrender under the duress of DC District Judge Dabney Friedrich’s court order. Wilson was pardoned on January 20th by President Trump, and now his neck is under the boot of a radical activist judge. She is disobeying a direct order by THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA and acting like a spoiled brat bully who hits her little sister because she wants to play with her toy, so her sister doesn’t have any fun either.

It is unbelievable that these unhinged individuals like Judge Friedrich are presiding over our federal courts. She has gone above and beyond her hatred for President Trump by doubling down on her bias towards a January 6th defendant, whose case she presided over. Dan WIlson should be a free man today. The government has recognized that the case against him falls under the scope of the Presidential Pardon.

Wilson has been fighting a case that is directly related to the January 6th-inspired FBI raid on his home. He was arrested after the FBI finished searching the residence, although he was not arrested for his attendance on January 6th.

Wait, what? Yes, the warrant was for J6, but he was arrested for another reason and NOT J6 (at the time). His arrest was for having guns at his home in Kentucky. Over 30 years ago, as a very young man, Wilson became a felon and served his time in prison. According to the law, he should not have had the guns in his home. Some may debate that constitutionally; he can have guns. However, in this case, for right now, it is a debate for another time because the law recognized by the people who lock you up is not debatable, but how they found these guns at his home is.

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Lawn Gone Liberty: The Update

It’s finally spring.

Better mow your lawn.

If you don’t, your town government may fine you thousands of dollars a day. 

Worse, if you can’t pay the fine, they may confiscate your home.

Six years ago, in Dunedin, Florida, Jim Ficken let his grass grow. 

His mom had died, and he’d left town to take care of her estate. He asked a friend to cut his grass, but that friend died, too!

In the two months Ficken was away, his grass grew taller than 10 inches.

City bureaucrats started fining him.

But they didn’t tell Ficken that. When he finally got back, there was no notice of the $500-a-day fine. Only when he ran into a “code enforcement officer” did he learn he’d be getting “a big bill.”

When the bill came, it was for $24,454.

Ficken quickly mowed his lawn. Then the city tacked on another $5,000 for “non-compliance.”

Ficken didn’t have that much money, so city officials told him they would take his home.

Fortunately, Ficken discovered the libertarian law firm, the Institute for Justice, which fights government abuse.

IJ lawyer Ari Bargil took on Ficken’s case, arguing that the $30,000 fine violates the Constitution’s limits on “excessive bail, fines, and cruel punishments.”

But a judge ruled that the fine was “not excessive.” 

Of course, judges are just lawyers with robes. Often they are lawyer/bureaucrats who’ve become very comfortable with big government.

I call a $30K penalty for not cutting your lawn absurdly excessive, 

IJ attorney Bargil told local news stations, “If $30,000 for tall grass in Florida is not excessive, it is hard to imagine what is.”

Dunedin’s politicians often impose heavy fines for minor transgressions.

One resident told us, “They fined me $32,000 for a hole the size of a quarter in my stucco … For a lawn mower in my yard … They fine people they can pick on … and they keep picking on them.” 

It happens elsewhere, too.

Charlotte, North Carolina, fined a church for “excessive pruning.”

Danbury, Connecticut, charged a resident $200,000 for leaving his yard messy.

Bargil notes, “It’s pretty apparent that code enforcement is a major cash cow.”

In just five-and-a-half years, Dunedin collected $3.6 million in fines. 

But by then, I and others had noticed. We were reporting on Dunedin’s heavy fines. 

So did the politicians sheepishly acknowledge that they had milked citizens with excessive fines and give the money back?

Of course not. They hired a PR firm. That cost taxpayers another $25,000 a month.

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The Swirling Vortex Of Weaponized Lawfare

Like a bad ‘When a chicken walked into a pub’ type of joke, when activist litigants walk into a courtroom and meet injunction-happy judges, the result is a swirling vortex of weaponised lawfare. In discussing the current jurisdictional kerfuffle between the US federal executive and judiciary, I find it impossible to overlook the total failure of the courts to protect people’s rights, dignity, and liberty under comprehensive assault from the administrative state during the Covid years. I accept the possibility that this may colour my judgment on the controversy.

It has become sadly obvious in recent years that the gravest threat to the theory and practice of democracy is not the rise of populism with wannabe fascists and neo-Nazis as their seductive tribunes, but technocratic elites with barely concealed disdain for the political beliefs and voting behaviour of the ‘deplorables.’ Moreover, as the firewalls of resistance to populist advance crumble one by one under assault from enraged voters, the final frontier of elite resistance is the courts. The legal clerisy—lawyers, law professors, and judges—is part of the ruling elite and the last line of defence for safeguarding victories already won by social justice warriors in their long march through the institutions.

Judicial Fallibility

Unlike every other profession, is the judiciary infallible? Clearly not, else they would not have been complicit in the biggest violation ever of people’s liberties and freedoms during the Covid years. Every country with a credible rule of law every so often overturns wrongful convictions from the past. Among the best-known Australian examples are those of Lindy Chamberlain and Cardinal George Pell.

As a corollary, are judges individually infallible and free of any influence of personal prejudices, beliefs, and life experiences? Again, clearly not. If they were, then in every single verdict heard by a bench of judges, verdicts would be unanimous and we could save considerable time and expense by dispensing with layers of appeal. From Australia consider the case of Cardinal Pell once again. He was convicted by jury verdict, the conviction was upheld 2-1 by the state appeals court, but overturned unanimously by the High Court of Australia (our apex court). Same laws, same evidence, different judgments.

Is every judge a paragon of judicial integrity and competence? Not so. A few are corrupt or guilty of other acts of malfeasance. Many more, I suspect, are incompetent rather than dishonest or corrupt. Mechanisms for acknowledging incompetence are fewer and less frequently invoked than for detecting and punishing corruption and malfeasance. Yet, even the latter cannot always be relied upon.

There is an interesting scandal playing out in India even now. On the night of 14 March, the official residence of a judge of the Delhi High Court,  Justice Yashwant Varma, went up in flames. Firefighters and police officers who rushed to deal with the conflagration discovered jute sacks of burnt-out cash. The Police Commissioner got in touch with the chief justice of Delhi High Court on the 15th to apprise him of developments, who in turn communicated the information to the Supreme Court of India. The Chief Justice of India established a three-judge panel to probe the matter and its report, which has been uploaded online (with redactions) in the interests of transparency given the intense public interest, substantiates that there are grounds for a full and proper inquiry. Justice Varma meanwhile has been transferred to another high court (against the protest of that court’s bar association) pending further investigations and action.

The hint of corruption would very likely have gone entirely undiscovered but for the fortuitous fire in the judge’s house. This in itself is an indictment of the inadequacy of oversight mechanisms for judges.

A final preliminary question: Unlike all other branches of government, is the judiciary collectively and are judges individually magically incapable of judicial overreach and in need of being put back in their lane? I suppose that such a perfect distribution of relative self-discipline among the branches of government is possible but, being an old cynic, forgive my scepticism. Not all judges have the necessary self-awareness and strength of character to avoid the temptation to abuse their powers and authority. On the contrary, the legal profession has a collective self-interest to expand the reach of its authority over all other sectors and, conversely, to protect itself from pushback by others.

A follow-up question is: How can the slow and deliberative process of judicial decision-making be reconciled with the need for sometimes urgent action by the executive? The judiciary is habituated into its own sequence and pace of actions. Thus for judges, the ultimate acquittal of Cardinal Pell by the High Court of Australia was a triumph of judicial institutions and process. To ordinary mortals, the process itself was a harsh punishment, and the 405 days that the aging cardinal spent behind bars was a damning miscarriage of justice.

In other words, from the date of his indictment in June 2017 through two jury trials, a first failed appeal, the final successful appeal, release from prison in April 2020, and death in January 2023 still unable to fully cleanse the taint of paedophilia, more than half of Cardinal Pell’s remaining time on earth was under malicious trial and punishment by a cadre of anti-Catholic Church activists out for blood. The nation demanded a scapegoat for the Catholic clergy’s historical sexual abuse of children. I write this not just as a non-Christian but as an atheist.

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