CBP's Predator Drone Flights Over LA Are a Dangerous Escalation
1 min read
Summary
US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) has confirmed that it is flying Predator drones over Los Angeles to support federal law enforcement operations, including those of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
State agencies elsewhere in the US also use drones for aerial surveillance to combat forest fires, for example, but armed Predators are a different matter.
Such drones were flown over Minneapolis during George Floyd protests in 2020, and with protests currently spreading across the US, experts predict more surveillance of this kind.
While the CBP denies it is monitoring first amendment activities, the powerful surveillance capabilities of these drones arguably make them very well suited to monitoring protests.
Scholars argue that the use of military technology on civilian populations is a worrying trend that people should resist normalising.
