#fourth amendment

The appointment of Bill Pulte to a prominent advisory role within Donald Trump’s political coalition has ignited a direct, high-stakes confrontation over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Pulte, a billionaire philanthropist and vocal critic of administrative overreach, has become the unexpected catalyst in a congressional war over Section 702. This controversial provision allows…

“By this logic, any protest could be a conspiracy,” said Robert Chang, a law professor at UC Irvine. With the conviction of three anti-ICE protesters in Spokane, Washington on federal “conspiracy” charges Thursday, civil rights advocates and legal experts fear that the Trump administration may have just been handed a powerful tool to criminalize dissent. Jac Archer, Justice Forral, and Bajun…

It's some deep garbage and has very suspicious timing.

Of course, when this law comes into play it will target open-source projects like Linux and even GrapheneOS with thousands of dollars worth of fines for each affected user exposed to software without age verification, which under the Cal. Civ. Code § 1798.500. a user is defined as "a child that is the primary user of the device" regardless of if you let a child use the device or not. Some bullshit right? This law is attempting to make the term 'user' synonymous with a human person under the age of 18.

Of course, this law which is coming into effect January 1st 2027 is going to require age verification checkpoints at the OS level. It will not just be limited to PCs or laptops either. It will target video game consoles, phones, smart TVs, and other IoT devices. It will ask you to upload government identification or biometric scans to prove age, along with age verification software that tracks your internet history to match it up with the ID presented. On phones, it will ask for age verification before allowing you, the owner of the phone, to download an app.

What this is going to do is shut down the legal ways for people wanting to escape this madness of constant tracking and having their data sold. Quite frankly, it's pissing me off.

The timing couldn't be more convenient either, right? People leaving Windows in a mass exodus, GrapheneOS coming under fire, and people leaving AI-implementing or age-verifying websites en masse. Not to mention social media is becoming a warzone for political revolutions and destroying the oligarchy. More and more people are getting fed up with this joke of a democracy and are willing to share it online. Do you think this new law is going to just stop in California? Or to protect kids?

My friends, it is a poorly disguised attempt for mass global surveillance to lock up dissenting voices and quell the coming revolution while at the same time making it illegal for open-source projects that care about your rights to continue existing. Apple, Google, and Microsoft can afford to implement this software and are actively lobbying (throwing money at politicians) to get this manner of law passed because it actively benefits them.

Not only that, but age verifying software is hacked all the time with this data being involved in massive breaches. Want to use an Onion browser through Tor? No longer private. Want to use a VPN (whatever good it does lol)? Waste of time. ProtonMail? Forgettaboutit. Want to side load a version of Tor called Tails onto a flashdrive and boot it up for your own personal private OS that uses working memory only instead of the hard drive and can be accessed via a bridge from a country that doesn't support age verification while simultaneously bypassing the existing computer's OS but leaving it untouched? Probably going to be illegal in the near future.

Oh, and I forgot to mention but this age verification software data can and will be freely given to law enforcement personnel upon request. I am not a criminal by any means, I just value the 4th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution--a document I feel a lot of politicians conveniently forget.

Supreme Court decided District of Columbia v. R.W., 608 U. S. __ (2026) on Mon, 20apr26. Decision was 7 - 2. Only J. Jackson wrote a dissent. The opinion was per curiam.

In the wee hours of a winter morning in Washington, D. C., District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Officer Clifford Vanterpool received a radio dispatch call directing him to check out a suspicious vehicle at a specific address. Officer Vanterpool reached the apartment building at that address around 2:00 a.m. As he turned his marked police vehicle into the parking lot, he saw two people immediately flee from a car, “unprovoked,” after “[p]olice had not done anything other than simply pull up.” *** The runners left open at least one of the car doors. The driver then began to back out of the parking space, rear door still open. Officer Vanterpool decided to investigate. He parked directly behind the car, left his own vehicle, ordered the driver, R. W., to put his hands up, and drew his service weapon.

The trial court held that Officer Vanterpool had a reasonable suspicion for stopping R.W. The D.C. Circuit held he did not have a reasonable suspicion and reversed the conviction.

In the first step of this analysis, it held that the trial court had erred by considering two factors: the radio dispatch call and the flight of R. W.’s companions. It “excis[ed]” those factors from the analysis. Id., at 597. It then concluded that, without more, the remaining facts—the late hour and the car’s movement—did not give rise to reasonable suspicion.

That's silly. Everyone knows that reasonable suspicion and probable cause are decided in the totality of the circumstances. You can't discount any facts.

The totality-of-the-circumstances test, however, “precludes this sort of divide-and-conquer analysis.” Arvizu, 534 U. S., at 274. As our precedents have recognized, “the whole is often greater than the sum of its parts—especially when the parts are viewed in isolation.”***

Supreme Court decided Zorn v. Linton, 607 U. S. __ (2026) on Mon, 23mar26. Opinion was unsigned and J.J. Sotomayor, Kagan, and Jackson dissented. The case considered when police officers are immune from litigation in federal courts over their use of force.

About 200 people linked arms in protest inside Vermont's state capitol. Shela Linton was one of the protestors; Sergeant Jacob Zorn was one of the people tasked with removing the protestors after the building closed for the day.

The officers dealt with them one at a time; some stood up and were escorted out of the chamber without force, but others refused to stand and had to be lifted to their feet or dragged out.

After removing more than a dozen protesters, the officers turned to Linton. Sergeant Jacob Zorn crouched down to speak with her, but she remained seated with her arms interlocked with those of her fellow protesters. As Linton passively resisted, Zorn unlinked her arm from another protester’s, put it behind her back in a rear wristlock, and twisted her arm.2 Linton exclaimed “‘ ow, ow, ow,’” while Zorn repeatedly implored her to “‘please stand up.’” *** After Linton responded, “‘I will not stand up,’” Zorn told her that he would ask “‘one more time’” and then would use more pain compliance. Id., at 48. Linton refused, so Zorn placed pressure on her wrist and lifted her up by her underarm. Linton yelled as she stood up. Once on her feet, Linton continued to jerk her arms and fell back to the floor. Zorn asked her to stand up again, and when she did not, three officers picked her up by her arms and legs and carried her outside. Linton alleged resulting physical and psychological injuries including post-traumatic stress disorder***

Linton sued in federal court for unconstitutional use of excessive force. The trial court granted judgment for Zorn, saying that he had qualified immunity from the litigation. The 2d Circuit reversed saying that he was not eligible for immunity.

It held that its decision in Amnesty America v. West Hartford, 361 F. 3d 113 (2004), clearly established that the “gratuitous” use of a rear wristlock on a protester passively resisting arrest constitutes excessive force.*** Government officials enjoy qualified immunity from suit under §1983 unless their conduct violates clearly established law. *** “A right is clearly established when it is ‘sufficiently clear that every reasonable official would have understood that what he is doing violates that right.’” Ibid. A right is not clearly established if existing precedent does not place the constitutional question “‘beyond debate.’”***

The Second Circuit concluded otherwise by reading Amnesty America to establish the general principle “that the gratuitous use of pain compliance techniques—such as a rear-wristlock—on a protestor who is passively resisting arrest constitutes excessive force.” *** But that principle, even assuming Amnesty America established it, lacks the “high degree of specificity” needed to make it “clear” to officers which actions violate the law. *** It does not “obviously resolve” whether using a rear wristlock to move a noncompliant protester after repeated warnings violates the Fourth Amendment, id., at 64, as it fails to specify which circumstances make the use of force “gratuitous.” Because the Second Circuit failed to identify a case where an officer taking similar actions in similar circumstances “was held to have violated” the Constitution, *** Zorn was entitled to qualified immunity. We grant his petition for writ of certiorari and reverse the judgment of the Second Circuit.

In Graham v. Connor, 490 U.S. 386 (1989), the Court said police were immune from federal constitutional litigation for injuring Graham. Graham was a diabetic who was going into diabetic shock. Police thought he was merely drunk and arrested him. In the process "Graham sustained a broken foot, cuts on his wrists, a bruised forehead, and an injured shoulder; he also claims to have developed a loud ringing in his right ear that continues to this day." If the police in that case were immune from suit, it's going to be really hard for someone to win federal constitutional litigation over a wrist lock at a protest.