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PaperclipPerfector  4d ago (text post)   17903 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 2, 2026

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I have conflicted feelings on what ICE is doing in MN. I think they were basically sent there specifically as an act of punishment against Walz and democrats for opposing Trump, which I find repugnant. I think their actual mandate to arrest criminal illegal aliens is obviously legal and something local governments shouldn't resist. I think the organized nature of the "protesting" is basically taking the form of a conspiracy to impede federal officer and the form it takes is cynically creating as many tense arrest scenarios as possible to farm clips of brutality which in effect is sacrificing human life on the altar of politics which is despicable. Never the less I think both shoots so far have been bad shoots, which I could take on the chin for the previous reasons but the Trump camp outright lying about the deceased is disgraceful.

This whole episode is a depressing spiral into the worst the red and blue tribe have to offer. I instinctively want to look away from it in shame. This is what we will be doing when we lift a machine intelligence to the heavens and all of civilization comes crashing down around us. A truly pathetic ending.

That said evaluating these asks:

  1. Targeted Enforcement – DHS officers cannot enter private property without a judicial warrant.

Reasonable if and only if the judiciary is cooperative, needs a clause to say if the judicial doesn't cooperate then they get to use some kind of makeshift ICE version.

End indiscriminate arrests and improve warrant procedures and standards.

I don't think indiscriminate arrets are happening because at the very least they're discriminating on some grounds, this is meaningless.

Require verification that a person is not a U.S. citizen before holding them in immigration detention.

Seems practically impossible. In practice this just turns ice vehicles int o immigration detention.

  1. No Masks – Prohibit ICE and immigration enforcement agents from wearing face coverings.

Seems reasonable. I understand the complaints, but sorry, if you're signing up to carry out the violence of the state your face is on the line. That's the deal.

  1. Require ID – Require DHS officers conducting immigration enforcement to display their agency, unique ID number and last name. Require them to verbalize their ID number and last name if asked.

Seems basically fine so long as the need to vocalize has some reasonable clause. Honestly though just stamp it on the body cam footage and make sure they're identifiable.

  1. Protect Sensitive Locations – Prohibit funds from being used to conduct enforcement near sensitive locations, including medical facilities, schools, child-care facilities, churches, polling places, courts, etc.

Na, this isn't the middle ages, no sanctuary, sanctuary is in your home country.

  1. Stop Racial Profiling – Prohibit DHS officers from conducting stops, questioning and searches based on an individual’s presence at certain locations, their job, their spoken language and accent or their race and ethnicity.

Racial profiling is a scourge and violation of liberalism. also I'm pretty sure a case is already going through to make them stop doing it. Presence in certain locations seems fair game though sorry, it's not to much to ask any citizen not to hang around the guy obviously hiring and paying illegals under the table.

  1. Uphold Use of Force Standards – Place into law a reasonable use of force policy, expand training and require certification of officers. In the case of an incident, the officer must be removed from the field until an investigation is conducted.

Mostly fine, obviously depends on details. In fact make use of the appropriations negotiation to fund good training for these officers.

  1. Ensure State and Local Coordination and Oversight – Preserve the ability of State and local jurisdictions to investigate and prosecute potential crimes and use of excessive force incidents. Require that evidence is preserved and shared with jurisdictions.

Sure, feds should share information with locals, if and only if the locals reciprocate. i.e. not if it's a sanctuary city.

Require the consent of States and localities to conduct large-scale operations outside of targeted immigration enforcement.

Na.

  1. Build Safeguards into the System – Make clear that all buildings where people are detained must abide by the same basic detention standards that require immediate access to a person’s attorney to prevent citizen arrests or detention.

Yeah, that's fair

Allow states to sue DHS for violations of all requirements.

All what violations?

Prohibit limitations on Member visits to ICE facilities regardless of how those facilities are funded.

All limitations? Surely you're want some limitations.

  1. Body Cameras for Accountability, Not Tracking – Require use of body-worn cameras when interacting with the public and mandate requirements for the storage and access of footage. Prohibit tracking, creating or maintaining databases of individuals participating in First Amendment activities.

Na, release them all. If the state has officer eyes on this why not let the public have eyes on it? Protestors are there to protest, why should not be seen? Completely ridiculous.

  1. No Paramilitary Police – Regulate and standardize the type of uniforms and equipment DHS officers carry during enforcement operations to bring them in line with civil enforcement.

Is ICE even particularly militarized? In all the videos I've seen they're in like rented SUVs wearing pretty normal kit.

Overall ranges from hard "No"s to reasonable enough stuff. We'll see how hard some of the more extravagant stuff is argued for.

Seems reasonable. I understand the complaints, but sorry, if you're signing up to carry out the violence of the state your face is on the line. That's the deal.

This is only reasonable if harassing off-duty ICE officers and their families is made a felony and is brutally and efficiently enforced. Given how conservative Supreme Court Justices were harassed at their homes (a federal crime!) we know it won't be

Seems reasonable. I understand the complaints, but sorry, if you're signing up to carry out the violence of the state your face is on the line. That's the deal.

You skipped quite a lot here. How adamant are you about this principle? Should this be a federal law: no facemasks for SWAT teams, Delta Force members or any police officers making high profile arrests of dangerous gangs, cartel members or other members of organized crime who routinely come after families of police officers? How do you feel abut undercover agents getting the ultimate mask in form of whole new identities during their operations so they can escape any accountability from public including those that sympathize with criminals they targeted?

Where is the boundary and how does it apply for ICE agents in now in year 2026?

Protect Sensitive Locations – Prohibit funds from being used to conduct enforcement near sensitive locations, including medical facilities, schools, child-care facilities, churches, polling places, courts, etc.

Na, this isn't the middle ages, no sanctuary, sanctuary is in your home country.

I think that's rather misconstruing the point of the request. The idea is not to create Hunchback of Notre Dame-style sanctuary areas, but to prevent misuse of ICE as an authoritarian tool - to prevent "immigration enforcement" being used an excuse for the state to send armed goons wherever it pleases, and especially where they can intimidate political opponents. The list above does seem a bit over-expansive, but the principle is sound. Above all, in the current climate I would not want ICE anywhere near a polling station during an election, just as a question of principle - and surely you'll grant that in no plausible scenario could that particular restriction result in substantially hindering immigration enforcement.

(Do I actively believe Trump would order ICE agents to threaten people into voting Republican? No, not really. But blah blah Caesar's wife blah blah. And indeed, even if the agents behaved impeccably, doing this would open the Red Tribe up to endless accusations otherwise from the Blue Tribe, and be fertile soil for a whole new "stolen election" craze. You do not want to live in that world.)

This seems more to do with how polling stations work rather than something that ought to attache to ICE in particular. Aren't there already laws around what can help in and around polling stations?

(Do I actively believe Trump would order ICE agents to threaten people into voting Republican? No, not really.

The point wouldn't be to threaten people into voting Republican. It would be to suppress turnout in blue precincts in purple states. There are a lot of US citizens who care more about not attracting the attention of hostile government authority figures than they do about voting.

Would Trump order ICE to run a major publicity campaign before the elections to say that they would be carrying out random immigration checks outside polling stations in Atlanta, Philadelphia etc? (State Republican parties have pulled this kind of stunt in the past) Actually carry out the checks? (probably not, although if it was Stephen Miller's call he would).

courts,

This is an interesting one. The key policy point here is that ICE should not be picking up illegal immigrants who came to their attention because they were victims or witnesses in criminal trials - otherwise you create bad incentives which undermine justice for US citizens and legal immigrants. But not arresting at courthouses is both over and underinclusive here - you do want to be able to arrest e.g. acquitted defendants, and you want a credible commitment not to arrest witnesses and victims outside the courthouse as well as inside it.

ICE should 100% be deporting illegals who pop up as witnesses. The entire point of ICE is to make it so illegals have no rights an self-deport.

This sets up some pretty fucked incentives. Setting up fucked incentives has historically not gone well.

This sets up some pretty fucked incentives. Setting up fucked incentives has historically not gone well.

Every prosecutors office in the country has people who know how to set up witness visas. This has been thought of.

People just don't like doing work.

I think the fear is that, if these witnesses do not show up, then the criminal they would have been testifying against will walk free, and potentially an American Citizen will be denied justice.

The problem is, we have let the problem go unaddressed for so long, no matter what we do there will be sympathetic people who have less than optimal outcomes. In aggregate I believe enforcing immigration law is the best action to take. There will be cases on the margin where someone gets screwed, but largely because of how big the problem got and how little we did to address it for decades, until it ballooned up past the point we could not ignore during Biden.

Agree. Trade-offs exists.

The fact that it says "near" rather than "in" implies a different motive not too dissimilar from restrictions we place on where sex offenders can live--if everywhere in town is "near" a sensitive location, then you've just made the entire city a sanctuary.

Certainly that's a valid concern, and a key reason why I would strike "schools and child-care facilities" from the list at least. But even if you believe that it's being used as a Trojan horse for this less savory gambit, I do think the principle I describe is valid in itself, and should be implemented even if divested of the excessive add-ons.

You would need to divest a lot more than just "schools and child-care facilities" to avoid the problem I mentioned. Further, if I agreed with that principle, I'd apply it to all government "goons", not just ICE. These provision proposals are clearly not being made in good faith.

If you're not careful here, you're going to end up with nonsensical results like "ATF can't arrest you for unlawfully possessing (or using) a machine gun, as long as you do so within 100 yards of an elementary school." Or the DEA for drugs. I guess there aren't any machine gun sanctuary states, so the local cops could still go after you, but those theoretically could exist in the current framework.

I guess there aren't any machine gun sanctuary states, so the local cops could still go after you, but those theoretically could exist in the current framework.

Missouri tried it, and it was specifically shot down by a federal court. For some strange reason, none of the people screeing about federalism now were offended then.

I guess there aren't any machine gun sanctuary states

I will start taking the anti-ICE protestors more seriously when they also advocate for states to ignore all federal firearm laws.

... now you're just threatening me with a good time. Can we advocate that the states ignore the FDA too while we're here?

Local cops are still "government goons". OP's principle generalizes to "the government shouldn't be permitted to enforce laws because doing so could be intimidating".

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