Will the 100 mile zone also include State Borders?
Via Fox News
A federal judge who endorsed “suspicion-less” searches of laptops, cameras and cell phones at the border has set up a possible Supreme Court showdown challenging what critics call “Constitution-free zones” and the Obama administration’s dragnet approach to national security.
A decision by Judge Edward Korman upholding the federal government’s right to search travelers’ electronic devices at or near the border conflicts with a similar ruling in California. That ruling requires a “reasonable suspicion” of criminal activity before agents can confiscate and examine personal photos, laptops and files. Korman’s ruling does not.
“I think Americans are justifiably becoming increasingly surprised and even outraged by the extent to which the national security state seems to be monitoring and collecting information about us all,” said ACLU Attorney Catherine Crump. “We think that having a purely suspicion-less policy is wrong, because it leaves border agents with no standards at all to follow. That opens the door that people will be [targeted] for inappropriate reasons.”
The ACLU originally challenged the administration’s policy, which can be applied anywhere within 100 miles of the border, after U.S. Customs agents stopped student Pascal Abidor on a train traveling from Canada to New York. After noticing Abidor had two passports — not uncommon for journalists and those with dual citizenship — agents asked to see his laptop. Since Abidor was a student of Middle Eastern affairs, his computer contained photos of political rallies held by Hamas and Hezbollah, known terrorist groups.
Never give the government power you wouldn't give your worst enemy.
ZitatThey that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety…
Freedom is not a gift bestowed upon us by other men, but a right that belongs to us by the laws of God and nature.
This will be the best security for maintaining our liberties. A nation of well-informed men who have been taught to know and prize the rights which God has given them cannot be enslaved. It is in the religion of ignorance that tyranny begins.