Live data from Hacker News

ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

techcrunch.com

71–80 of 230 posts

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#71
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you mean we created an environment where people could come and find success and live their lives, and we perhaps weren’t as strict as we could’ve been in some situations… I don’t think that violently kidnapping people off the streets, without showing badges, in unmarked vehicles, masked, etc is a punishment that fits the crime. Missing a court date once multiple years ago, failing to navigate a complex process, an…

Obama was quite strict about it and deported tons of illegals. An arrest isn't a violent kidnapping. Being arrested by the feds for breaking the law has usually been a fairly unpleasant ordeal. Most Americans support the idea of deporting people who break our immigration laws, thusly cutting in line while millions of others patiently wait. This really doesn't have to be an emotional issue. Very few Americans support…

> Being arrested by the feds for breaking the law has usually been a fairly unpleasant ordeal.

> This really doesn't have to be an emotional issue.

I think you're misreading the OP and/or ignoring recent news. OP's contention is that the way it's being executed deserves an emotional response -- everything from ignoring judges to send people to El Salvadoran mega-prisons, to roaming streets in masks with creditable allegations about racial profiling. [0]

I'd like to know more about your claim about feeding, housing, and providing care to the whole world.

[0] https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/08/us/politics/supreme-court...

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#72
post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The SCOTUS abdicating their duty to the constitution does not make ICE's actions any less illegal, it just makes the Supreme Court as an institution illegitimate. It is unfortunate that things have devolved so far, but it is more important than ever that we state things clearly and succinctly in the face of those that have decided the constitution no longer matters.

The constitution doesn't prohibit the deportation of illegal immigrants. It's interesting that you believe the Supreme Court is illegitimate for rightly ruling based on the letter of the law. If you want it changed, you have 100 ways to advocate for that without declaring one of the greatest American institutions we have as "illegitimate". It's an extreme view, but certainly common in shrinking hyper-left-wing online…

> The constitution doesn't prohibit the deportation of illegal immigrants.

Who are you responding to? I don't see that anywhere in this thread.

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#73
post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you mean we created an environment where people could come and find success and live their lives, and we perhaps weren’t as strict as we could’ve been in some situations… I don’t think that violently kidnapping people off the streets, without showing badges, in unmarked vehicles, masked, etc is a punishment that fits the crime. Missing a court date once multiple years ago, failing to navigate a complex process, an…

Obama was quite strict about it and deported tons of illegals. An arrest isn't a violent kidnapping. Being arrested by the feds for breaking the law has usually been a fairly unpleasant ordeal. Most Americans support the idea of deporting people who break our immigration laws, thusly cutting in line while millions of others patiently wait. This really doesn't have to be an emotional issue. Very few Americans support…

Obama’s deportation numbers were juiced compared to post-2015 numbers because there was a change in the definition of that term.

Obama’s deportations were mostly border patrol apprehending and pushing people back across the border, not ICE being super efficient at rounding up people in the interior of the country.

A good primer on immigration enforcement before and during the Obama admin:

https://www.migrationpolicy.org/article/obama-record-deporta...

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well also a lot of what they're doing to enforce laws without warrants, arresting citizens without cause, lack of due process, etc is illegal. But a lot of this won't change without "active, provocative, non-violent" resistance as Gandhi would say.

Out of curiosity, what makes "arresting citizens" illegal? If I'm in a crowd in the presence of a number of other law breakers, why would I think that I couldn't ever be temporarily detained? I mean, yes, it shouldn't be indefinite and there shouldn't be a high bar to clear to prove actual innocence, but we have process for this. I can be arrested without much provocation at all. I then have to be charged, I have the…

I should have said "without cause" (now edited). Brown folks are detained randomly because they don't have their papers on them and "look Mexican".

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lol what? "They want/intend to be a paramilitary organization therefore calling them wannabe paramilitaries isn't correct." Genuine curiosity, what did the motorcade look like? Gov plates or personal vehicles? Was the helicopter ICE or local police keeping an eye on things?

> "They want/intend to be a paramilitary organization therefore calling them wannabe paramilitaries isn't correct." (I never said what you’re falsely quoting.) An armed civilian organisation that wants to be—and behaves like—the military has satisfied the most important (and usually difficult to prove) requirement of paramilitarism. The only remaining question, if we’ve established intent, is capability. They obvious…

> Falsely quoting

What's the acceptable notation for paraphrasing? I typically use > for quotes.

Agreed, most of this is an unnecessary argument over terminology when I was simply calling them Temu Stasi.

We'll see about the secret police thing, for now they seem to be just about getting their deportation bounties.

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#76
post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>They're rounding up, detaining and arresting US citizens and destroying their property under the guise of sweeping illegal immigrants. What's the proportion of US citizens arrested compared to actual illegal immigrants?

I'm sorry, why does the proportion matter? What happened to the presumption of innocence? Are you saying you, personally, would be OK with being rounded up and arrested as long as they got X illegal immigrants along the way?

Presumption of innocence applies to your trial, not to being apprehended. E.g. the state has to prove that you are guilty.

If I'm a US citizen and I get swept up in an immigration raid, my lawyer calls my wife who brings my US passport and I'm released. A pain in the ass, but not a violation of my civil rights. Now if I get beat up by ICE, or they file a false claim for resisting, then sure, we've got grounds for a case that my rights were violated. But constitutional rights are not a blanket "I can never be arrested if I think I'm innocent"

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm sorry, why does the proportion matter? What happened to the presumption of innocence? Are you saying you, personally, would be OK with being rounded up and arrested as long as they got X illegal immigrants along the way?

Presumption of innocence applies to your trial, not to being apprehended. E.g. the state has to prove that you are guilty. If I'm a US citizen and I get swept up in an immigration raid, my lawyer calls my wife who brings my US passport and I'm released. A pain in the ass, but not a violation of my civil rights. Now if I get beat up by ICE, or they file a false claim for resisting, then sure, we've got grounds for a c…

You cannot be arrested without probable cause. Being arrested in a dragnet immigration raid is just a crystal clear fourth amendment violation. Simple as that.

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#78
post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Well it might be emotional if you're one of these people about to be sent to South Sudan It's either right or wrong for ICE to run a dragnet through a city, cuffing everyone, checking their papers, as they hope to find someone undocumented. Either human beings have rights and deserve due process, or they don't. People are reduced to the point of keeping airtags on them so loved ones and their lawyers can find them be…

[flagged]

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#79
post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well it might be emotional if you're one of these people about to be sent to South Sudan It's either right or wrong for ICE to run a dragnet through a city, cuffing everyone, checking their papers, as they hope to find someone undocumented. Either human beings have rights and deserve due process, or they don't. People are reduced to the point of keeping airtags on them so loved ones and their lawyers can find them be…

[flagged]

> That's not happening

Yes it is [1].

[1] https://chicago.suntimes.com/immigration/2025/10/01/massive-...

Re: ICE bought vehicles equipped with fake cell towers to spy on phones

#80

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Federal law supersedes state law It does. That doesn’t mean federal agents supersede state law. California restricted civil arrests at its courts [1]. The Congress can pass a law superseding this. What ICE can’t unilaterally do, legally, is ignore it. They have, the same as they’ve ignored federal court orders. [1] https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtm...

[flagged]

> I'd imagine the California arrest restriction at it's courts is not constitutional as it conflicts with enforcement of existing federal immigration laws

Preëmption is about conflicts of laws [1]. You’d need statute giving ICE the power to enforce its will in state courthouses to preëmpt California law.

> Even if it's for cheap labor, Democrats

I live in a red state. We started to see ICE enforcement and then our Senators told them to fuck off.

To the extent we have a safe zone from immigration enforcement, it's in Republican economic strongholds [2].

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Federal_preemption

[2] https://www.reuters.com/world/us/ice-walks-back-limits-raids...

Post reply on HN